


The Nature Of The Beast

by AntiGravitas



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Animagus!Percival, M/M, Mistaken Identity, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-29
Updated: 2018-09-01
Packaged: 2019-04-29 17:11:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 119,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14477391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AntiGravitas/pseuds/AntiGravitas
Summary: When Newt rescues a wounded jaguar, little does he know he's carrying MACUSA's own Percival Graves along in his case. Trapped in his animagus form, Percival just wants to get home and catch the guy that did this to him. By the time they reach New York, Newt has told his new jaguar familiar any number of secrets, and Percival Graves thinks he might be in love.Unfortunately for him, Newt's not going to react well to discovering his familiar's true identity, and now Percival must find a way to convince him that he's not just a sneaky bastard, and that dinner at eight really is a great idea.





	1. Blood on the Snow

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is planned as complete in 11 chapters and an epilogue, and I’m not even going to pretend they’re going to be short or even of roughly equal length. For the sake of making you laugh later, I currently estimate the total word count will be around 30k. Place your bets now.
> 
> Hope you enjoy. :]

**Part I - Trapped.**

 

Beneath a blanket of late February snow New York lies sleeping quietly, while 1400 miles north and west a jaguar runs. His paws reach in steady rhythm, the flex and bunch of his muscles an echo of the powerful heart beating in his breast. Black like the deepest shadows, he cuts a stark contrast against the snow that buries the paths beneath its muffling weight. He’s far from his home and further still from the lands his form might have called native, but here now, in the snows of the forest, he is alive. 

Percival Graves lets the magic of the open forest thrill through him, feeling with his wizard’s senses the raw power of the land, unbent by the weight of a human city, or the worn roads of claimed territory. Not untouched, never, because there have always been people, but not made sluggish by the gravitational pull of massed civilisation. With his jaguar’s senses he can feel the biting cold even through his thick coat, smell the musk of the trees and the clean scent of new snow. His blood thrums with the borrowed energy of endurance potions and strength enhancers, internal aids rather than charms that might render him easy to pick out were he to wrap his body in magic.

He doesn’t run for long, this body may be powerful but it’s not made for distance, and soon he pads to a halt beneath the branches of a tilting spruce tree, taking a moment to give in to the demands of his jaguar form and rake his claws down the leaning trunk. Something about the action feels viscerally good to him, and once he’s done he lifts his head to scent the air. The forest birds are singing, and in their unconcerned aggression towards one another Percival hears no hint of warning.

The packet he’s carrying between his teeth tastes of leather and faintly of wax, its contents securely locked up against the weather and the inside of his mouth. Briefly he drops it to the snow and flexes his jaws wide to be rid of the stiffness that’s starting to creep into his muscles, the movement turning to a yawn that shows off his magnificent fangs. Then he sniffs the air again, searching for the scent. It takes a moment but there it is, the barest hint on the air, something of magic and the unmistakable scent trail of the tag he managed to affix to his target. Unnoticeable to a human nose, but to an animagus in his jaguar form? The easiest scent to follow. 

Dipping his head to retrieve his package, Percival picks up the chase and sets out again through the forest. 

The trees bow beneath the weight of the snow on their boughs, and as he runs he tries to pick the path of least resistance, where the snow is thinnest and he doesn’t have to leap as high to forge a path. The man he’s pursuing is flying broomback, and moving at a much faster pace than Percival can run. Still, anonymity and ease of pursuit make his jaguar form ideal. This body can track far better than Percival’s human form, and do so without alerting his target to the fact he’s being tailed by MACUSA’s own Director of Magical Security. At least, that’s the reason that went on the paperwork. An alternate and just as viable reason is that it’s simply been too long since Percival went out wearing his jaguar form, and he’s  _ missed _ it. 

It takes him six days before he finds the place. The trail turns back on itself and begins to curve around, overlapping lines of scent that speak of a person circling in search of something. He can tell the age of the trails by the deterioration of the scent, and thinks himself maybe two days behind his target. Focus sharpened by the sudden immediacy of his destination, Percival finds himself a secure spot to stash his package, digging beneath the snow in the lee of a fallen tree, and burying the little packet of documents deeply enough that no other curious creature might think it worth the effort to investigate. Afterwards he slips on through the trees as night rises around him, the glory of stars bright between the reaching branches overhead. 

The hot scent of human leads him to the spot. The man smells of sweat and cold creams, unguents for his wind-chapped face, and a scratchy scent of tobacco smoke that raises the hackles on the back of Percival’s neck. What might be pleasant in a quiet club, or enjoyed before the fire of an evening, is a hardwired warning to run in this second form of his. He resists it, shaking off the drive of instinct and creeping stealthily forward through the trees. The cave, when he finds it, is clearly indicated by the disturbances in the snow around it. A trail of footprints leads from the edge of a small break in the trees, to a rise of rock-face that juts maybe the height of a man’s shoulders from the ground. The trees fall away on either side, the soil too thin here to support their weight, and the whole is covered by a blanket of ice and snow. Percival suspects that during the spring this rocky rise might provide a welcome sunning spot for one such as he. 

For now, all is silent save for the distant thump of snow sliding from an overburdened branch and pattering to the ground. The human scent about this place is fresh, but not immediate, and after some time spent simply listening and waiting, he makes his move. Slinking around the edge of the clearing, approaching the entrance to the cave from the side, he employs every advantage of his jaguar form, applying his beast body’s natural hunting abilities to the task of infiltration. If Frederick Goodfellow, smuggler and thief, is still in residence, then he won’t see this auror coming.

The cave, as expected, is unwarded. Percival lets his magical senses extend, testing the aether for any hint of the telltale pull of a charm, much as a jaguar might lift his head to scent the air. Nothing. Goodfellow is little better than a squib, barely capable of keeping a broom aloft, his stock in trade being other people’s magic, and thus his stockpile of smuggled goods is out here in the wilderness rather than magically secured in a more convenient location. It works to MACUSA’s advantage in its own way: stored out here there is simply no denying the illegality of the hoard. 

The inside of the cave is dark, and smells of bear. Percival lifts his lip to scent the musk, knowing from the sourness of it that whatever beast once lived here has not used this place for years. The cave is large enough to easily fit three men inside, and in the light from the entrance his sharp eyes can pick out the outline of several stacked crates at the very back of the space. Carefully, alert to any possible trap, he pads forward, ears flicking back and forth between the entrance and what’s ahead. He’s almost to the tumble of boxes when he hears it. Or  _ feels _ it. 

There’s a pulse of magic that stops him cold, paw half-lifted, a sudden half-vision shot through with ice and salt, the sea, and somehow, a woman’s voice, low and muffled. The rush of it slides over his mental shielding, most of its power turned aside but still a part of it potent enough to prick at his spirit even through his defences. He turns his head slowly until he locates the source of the power, a thin and oddly distant rhythm of  _ something  _ beating repetitively against his mind. There’s nothing in it that suggests an attack, but still he shifts cautiously to one side, angling around slightly to confirm the origin of the sensation. 

Lying on one of the crates there is a small jewellery box, turned on its side as though someone has carelessly dropped it, its lid open, contents spilled out in a tumble of bone and twine. A small, unevenly shaped disk, the details of which Percival cannot make out, even with his jaguar’s night eyes, is nestled in the centre, and it is from this that the magic emanates. Closer now, he can feel the rhythmic pulsing for what it is, the push and pull of the ocean, the clap of water against ice, and the hiss of the wind across the tundra. He’s never been far enough north to have experienced these things in person, and yet here in this forest cave he’s absolutely certain of what he’s feeling. 

Only idiots and the soon to be cursed touch unknown magical artefacts, and Percival Graves considers himself to be neither of these things. He has a moment then, drawn out and oddly calm, as his jaguar inclinations move him to press his nose against the edge of the amulet and scent it gently, to wonder  _ why did I do that? _ And then he is drowning. 

Some distant, professional part of him understands that he’s just been cursed, and that the sudden overwhelming shock of emotion and physical sensation is all a part of that process. The rest of him, human and jaguar side alike, is screaming with panic at the ice that’s clutching his body, weighing down his limbs and creeping into his heart, slowing his blood and making his body ache with the cold of it. There’s water in his lungs, the sensation of choking, of breathlessness making his head spin and his muscles clench spasmodically. And worse somehow is the feeling of being drained, of every spark of his magic being drawn out of him, eaten up by some ravenous, despairing force of will that makes him claw at the earth where he has fallen, his talons turning up rock and dirt in his fear. 

He doesn’t know for how long he lies there on the floor of the cave, limbs twitching, feeling as though his very spirit has been stolen from him. Everything suddenly seems so much more quiet. The pounding of the sea against the ice is gone, and that distant moaning voice has faded into nothing but his own laboured breathing. He can hear his heart beating in his skull, making his legs jerk with every pulse. When he reaches for his magic to transform himself back, he finds his reserves empty, and shocked, begins to scramble to his feet. He must get away from here, find a place and recover himself so that he can check his magic over properly and break whatever curse has been laid upon him. But his thoughts, like his body, feel sluggish and slow. 

He hears Frederick Goodfellow return before he sees him. The man has his wand raised, the silvery light of a lumos spell making the shadows suddenly flicker and dance in time with his footsteps. Percival, with great effort, hauls himself onto his belly and then up into a lopsided sitting position, and for a moment their eyes meet. The man is carrying in his off hand a long stick with a snapped off side-branch on the end, which Percival admits makes for a perfect makeshift tool for moving an artefact one had accidentally spilled from its container. They regard one another in silence for a stretched moment, and then Goodfellow, confronted with a wild beast in an enclosed space, immediately panics. 

His first spell catches Percival full across the face, and the shock of it sends him reeling. Petty wizard or not, abject fear can make a potent adversary of any magical foe, and of course this particular man would be the type capable of channelling that emotion into power rather than simply folding in the face of danger. With a snarl Percival rolls, scrambling out of the way, and the next bludgeoning hex hits the floor next to him in a spray of dirt. His limbs feel as unresponsive as a drunk’s, and his body feels curiously heavy on his forelegs, as though someone has placed a huge weight between his shoulders. There’s a horrible numbness in his paws and movement is made difficult by his inability to feel the earth beneath his pads. Nonetheless adrenaline pushes him onwards, and he makes a leap forwards, hoping to take the man down.

Goodfellow is faster than him. He throws himself sideways at Percival’s clumsy charge, slinging a shrieking hex in the jaguar’s direction that cuts the thick pelt of Percival’s flank and leaves a spray of blood on the floor. Percival’s howl comes out as a roar of pain, made sharp by the realisation that his innate magical defences have been completely drained. The man’s spells, where once they might have bounced off his naturally built up magical shields, now cut through to the flesh without hindrance. It makes of Goodfellow a far more deadly foe than he has any right to be to MACUSA’s Director. 

Realising the danger of his situation, Percival disregards pride and flees for the cave entrance. If he can get across the clearing and into the trees then he can lose himself in the night time woods, and owing to the snow, Goodfellow is unlikely to pursue. 

He’s almost correct. In a fury of panic, the sight of the intruder’s retreat seems to galvanise the thief to action. He follows Percival out into the clearing in a storm of slicing and bludgeoning hexes that alternately whip across the jaguar’s haunches and almost knock his legs out from under him. Stunned and alarmed by the ferocity of the attack, with head still swimming from the aftereffects of the curse, it is all Percival can do to scramble away in retreat. He can feel blood running down his flanks, and pain burns across his skin, his hind legs bruised almost to breaking by the relentless assault. For one awful moment as his paws slip and he loses purchase in the snow, he thinks that the man is actually going to succeed in killing him.  

And then Goodfellow, lesser wizard as he is, runs out of energy. He stands in the middle of the small break in the trees, bent almost double with the effort of his spells, gasping wretchedly but triumphant in his success, certain that he has driven off a dangerous predator. Percival for his part makes it to the cover of the trees, limping and awkward, bleeding profusely, and dives onwards into the night, desperate to put some distance between them. 

Very quickly he loses track of his whereabouts, his thoughts consumed by the agony of his wounds, and the forest becomes a blur of shadow around him. He stumbles onwards, feeling the heat draining from his body and knowing with dreadful certainty that if he stops, even for a moment, he will lie down and not get up again. 

Around him the forest closes in, and stretching off behind him through the snow, his paw prints are dark with blood.

 

*

 

The Jackalope’s bright eyes reflect the light of the half-moon, and its delicate nose twitches, a picture of timidity that belies its fearsome nature. Newt wets his lips in anticipation, and then has to dip his chin behind the folds of his scarf to stop the bitter cold of the night time forest from chapping them even more than they already are. The forests of North Minnesota are bitterly cold at this time of year, and if it weren’t for the heating charms he’s applied to every item of his clothing he’d have frozen long before now. 

With a cautious hop the Jackalope begins to move away from his open case, first tentatively and then with increasing confidence. Pleased by this, Newt slowly lifts the lid of his case closed, sealing the heat - and the rest of his menagerie - safely inside, and watches the beast explore. Molly, as he’s named her, had been a lucky find. On display at a backwater muggle curiosity shop, most visitors to the nickel show were unimpressed by the Jackalope, claiming they could see the string attaching the antlers to the bunny’s head. Newt however had known the beast for what it was from the moment he’d laid eyes on it. He’d purchased her for an extortionate amount by pretending to be a collector from abroad, but stealing her had seemed a little harsh considering the owners hadn’t actually been abusing her. A few months of rest and recuperation in his case, and a steady, plentiful diet, had seen her returned to her full weight, and now, reluctant to keep her any longer than necessary, he’s back up north to release her into her natural habitat. She, at least, isn’t bothered in any way by the biting cold.

Suddenly, the Jackalope freezes. Newt follows the line of her gaze, watching as she lifts herself onto her hind legs to peer into the darkness, her nose twitching. He can see nothing in the shadows, but Molly appears adamant that they are not alone, so Newt keeps still and listens. It takes a minute before he hears it. A slow slide and thud of footsteps amongst the trees, as though something is meandering unsteadily through the snow. It sounds like an animal, and a large one at that. With a flick of his wand Newt casts up a notice-me-not, and watches the tree line.

When the beast finally blunders into the clearing, it’s immediately apparent that something is very badly wrong. Molly takes one look at the enormous predator and makes a break for the shelter of the forest. She vanishes into the trees in long, loping bounds, leaving Newt to watch the approaching creature with silent astonishment. 

In all honesty, Newt Scamander hasn’t spent an awful lot of his career studying non-magical beasts. On the other hand, the zoologist part of his profession includes beasts of all types, fantastic or not, and he is therefore entirely certain that the huge black jaguar making its unsteady way across the clearing is most certainly not native to these parts. By the time it’s stumbled its way a few feet from the trees and out into the moonlight, he can see for certain that something is most definitely wrong with it. The jaguar is maybe twenty feet from him now, and although he is certain it hasn’t seen him, he’s still wary when the beast comes to a swaying halt. 

Newt lifts his chin and sniffs the air. The cold almost closes his throat up, but he has enough time to smell what he suspects. The beast reeks of sweat and blood, and now that it’s still, Newt can see dark droplets dripping from its fur like melting ice, pattering to the snow in unsteady rhythm. He watches, alarmed, as the beast sways and then lies down suddenly, its legs giving way all at once. 

For a long moment Newt simply stares at the creature, astonished and uncertain. Clearly, it’s in need. But this is no magical beast, and the way of the wild is harsh and unfair. He can’t be rescuing every wounded creature he comes across - that’s simply impossible, and goes entirely against the code of field magizoology. Besides which, creatures become wounded and die  _ all _ the time, that’s just the way it is. Even if they do somehow manage to come and die right in front of a person. That could absolutely help them.

_ "Damn it,"  _ Newt whispers to himself.

As he gently floats the beast back in the direction of his tent, he consoles himself with the fact that even if the creature is not in any way magical, it’s certainly a long way from home, and that in itself is a mystery worth investigating. 

 

*

 

It snows again overnight, another two and a half feet of blanketing white that’s a little unseasonably heavy even for this part of the world. Newt pokes his head out of the tent flaps in the morning, blinking blearily around at the world and squinting against the brilliant glare of sunlight on the snow. Having spent the last six hours immersed in healing spells, he feels somewhat lightheaded and woozy from magic expenditure and lack of sleep alike. 

The jaguar lies on its side on a heated blanket within the tent, sleeping the sleep of the magically knocked out - the last thing Newt wants is for it to wake up and take a swipe at him while he’s not paying attention. It’s one thing to trust to the innately fair spirit of a Nundu, quite another to trust the instincts of a non-magical beast. Letting the tent flap fall closed, Newt runs a hand through his hair, and wonders what he’s going to do.

The inside of the tent is a single, roomy chamber, slightly expanded from what the outside dimensions would imply, giving space enough within for a single bed roll, a chair, table and a small chest for ease of access to odds and ends. Generally, when travelling alone, Newt doesn’t need more than this, for the vast majority of his kit is down in his case. Now the space is largely taken up by his bedroll and the simply enormous black jaguar snoring softly beside it.  

Taking a seat on the chair, Newt rests his elbows on his knees and considers the beast. Wounded rather than sick, the creature had been in an appalling state last night. Its hide had been cut with several large, deep, gashes, and its legs and body had made Newt’s healing senses tingle in sympathy with the evidence of severe bruising. The list of life-threatening problems had been long and grave. Extreme loss of blood that was very close to being fatal. Wounding-induced hypothermia. Severe shock. It is frankly astonishing to Newt that he’d even managed to stabilise the creature as much as he had. Even so it’s going to be some days before he’s able to let the beast wake up and be on its way. In fact, it’s very likely he’s going to have to nurse him for a few weeks. 

Newt sighs. This is not ideal. He’d rather not have the jaguar down in his case with the rest of his creatures. Magical beasts often react strangely to the presence of non-magical predators, and keeping them all living in harmony with one another can be difficult enough at the best of times.  _ Still, we do what we must _ , he thinks.

He shakes his head. And course there’s the mystery of what this creature is doing out here in the first place. He, for Newt has ascertained that the beast is male, is the biggest jaguar Newt has ever seen, and he’s spent months in the jungles of Brazil during which time he’d actually been lucky enough to spot a couple. With a coat so black that Newt must tilt his head just right to see anything of his spots, the cat is sleekly muscled, heavy in the shoulders, with striking yellow eyes. His age is apparent in the slight greying around his muzzle, and the scars that criss-cross his belly speak of a life spent battling. Clearly he’s been in fights before, although perhaps this is the first time he’s lost one quite so badly. 

Perhaps, far from his own territory, he’d been seeking shelter from the snow and had a run-in with a sleeping bear. The wounding could have come from claws, and the slice across the face had suggested that if he hadn’t started the fight himself then he’d at least had some sort of a go at keeping it going. Newt sighs again. It all suggests a level of aggression to the creature he’s going to have to be very careful of once he finally wakes up. For now though, he’s soundly under the effects of a sleeping charm, and speaking of sleeping-...

Resetting his alarm charms is the work of moments, even doing so while peeking out from behind the tent flap, and then, thoroughly exhausted, Newt wraps himself up in his bedroll and passes out.

  
  



	2. Rest and Recovery

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Percival recovers, but all is not yet well.

Percival drifts, half-dead, the sound of the ocean in his ears and the deep cold of the tundra in his bones. He is aware only vaguely of the passing of time and only then by the changing of the shadows. There’s light, bright enough to blind, which reflects in glittering fractals of colour from the crystals of snow beneath his feet; and dark, suffocating and vast like the depths of the water beneath the ice. Sometimes he stands and listens to the wind howling, and at times in the rushing of it he can hear the rise and fall of a voice. His body feels heavy and then light, cold and then brilliantly, ecstatically feverish, burning him up with the need to run, to escape the flames that flicker in his blood. On his blanket in Newt’s tent he sweats and suffers through the healing spells as they pull on his body’s own natural reserves of magic, and, finding them empty, burn up his muscle and fat instead.  

Sometimes he drifts close to consciousness, and on those occasions the world smells of human and tea and potions and most importantly  _ wizard _ , and then a pair of hands are smoothing over his head, closing his eyes with their magic and he drifts back into sleep still fighting to say  _ wait, wait! I need to talk to you, please- _

Time drifts interminably on in a haze of fever dreams and unpleasant half-visions that break apart and turn back on themselves until he can no longer say how long it has been. He chases the voice of the woman he hears, but he never catches her, always a step behind, over the next rise in the land, or a little further along the coast, following the iron grey line of the sea. 

He wakes, finally, to sunlight and the fresh scent of blood. His nose twitches despite himself, and his body tells him that it  _ wants _ , hunger a painful claw in his belly. He lifts his head, and although the movement requires effort, there’s very little pain to it. The wizard in the corner is so still and silent that Percival almost misses him the first time his gaze passes around the inside of the tent. There’s a bowl of diced rabbit near to his head, and the scent of the meat is so overpoweringly inviting that it’s a struggle to pull his head away again to focus on his rescuer.  

“You,” he says, and the word comes out as a moaning growl. 

“Easy now,” the wizard says softly. “Have some food. I’m not here to hurt you.”

There are far too many things Percival needs to communicate to this man before he can do something so mundane as eat, but his body refuses to listen. There’s a deep weakness in him that he recognises as the physical drain from intensive healing, and the severity of it shocks him. Healing spells draw their power from caster and recipient alike, that balance only swaying its full debt to the caster in the case of the most skilled and experienced healers. It’s why healing No-Majs can be such a pain in the ass; they have no magic of their own to contribute to their recovery. For him to feel so drained either his wounds were even deeper than he realised, or his magic is somehow suffering. A thrill of fear goes through him at the thought. When he reaches, he finds that he simply cannot  _ push _ in the way that should make his body begin its transformation back to human. The magic is there, the skeleton of it, but there is simply no weight of magical reserve to power his intent. 

With effort Percival reins in his rising panic. A lack of transformative ability is not unlikely considering the effects of that curse. The damned thing had wiped his reserves completely the moment he’d touched whatever had set it off, and, even if he hadn’t immediately become embroiled in a knock-down drag-out fight, it would have taken him a day or two to recover. As is, it looks like his moderately talented rescuer has used up whatever he had left in helping to power his healing, and that’s hardly something Percival can blame him for. The man has obviously saved his life.

Steadying his breathing, Percival hauls himself up onto his side. There is pain, but it’s muted. The dull rumble of bruising rather than the agonising shriek of open wounds.  _ Eat, _ he thinks to himself.  _ Get some strength back. Everything else in a moment. _

The rabbit tastes as fresh as it smells, and Percival eats everything that’s been set out for him. There’s water too, which he laps at eagerly, amazed at the depth of his thirst. Finally, when he’s finished, he hears the wizard moving behind him.  _ Oh hell no, _ he thinks.  _ No you damned well don’t.  _

Before the wizard can get close enough to lay his sleep charms on him, with an enormous effort Percival drags himself to his feet and makes a bid for the tent flap. Behind him, he hears the wizard give a soft, dismayed cry. The fabric is tied closed, but Percival uses his weight to push out between the flaps, making the whole tent shudder on its poles. He scrambles through to find the snow immediately outside the tent’s entrance has been cleared away allowing easy access, and he’s left blinking painfully in the bright afternoon sunlight.

The sky above is an astonishing blue, and Percival finds he has emerged into a bright clearing in the forest, large enough to fit four or five such tents as the one in which he’s been recovering. The snow either side of the cleared entrance rises to a height of four feet, and it’s clearly only charmwork that has kept it from drifting severely enough to bury the tent entirely. Stymied by the sight, Percival pauses. He’d intended to write in an undisturbed surface of snow a message to his rescuer detailing his situation, but it’s clear that will not be possible. Instead he looks down at the mush beneath his feet. It’s fine, he can smooth this out and make do. 

Breathing heavily, and sweating all of a sudden with the effort of simply being on his feet, he begins to scrape the snow smooth with his front paws. He’ll start with a simple greeting, enough to communicate his magical nature, and then go from there. Beside him the tent flap has been cautiously opened, and he can see out of the corner of his eye the tip of the wizard’s wand. “Just wait,” he tells him, though the words come out as a frustrated growl.

The wizard doesn’t seem eager to approach, watching him warily to see what he’s doing. Percival’s glad of his caution, for even if his healing’s not expert level his ability to cast sleep charms apparently is, and the last thing he needs is to be put back under. Satisfied he has a small area to write in, Percival stares down at the snow and tries to think of the best opener. And tries. He becomes aware that he’s still staring when the wizard shifts fractionally, uncertain what he’s doing. 

The words will not come. He can’t-...there’s something-...he just needs to clear his mind and focus. Percival stands, breathing hard, his body aching, an awful panic starting to rise up in his belly. He just can’t  _ remember _ how to form the words. He can speak them in his mind, clear as day, and yet when he tries to think of the shapes that will convey them in written form the lines and curves just slip away, his mind unable to find purchase on the suddenly complex puzzle of their shape. Panting, and feeling a chill that’s not all to do with the snow beneath his feet, his mind races.

He’s heard of spellshock like this, and it is Bad News. Sometimes, if it’s severe enough, it takes a mind healer’s help to get rid of it. Dismayed, and more than a little unnerved, Percival looks up into the wizard’s eyes and says, “I can’t remember the words. I just can’t-”

The wizard has gentle green eyes and a fringe of red-blond curls from beneath which he is peering with uncomprehending concern at Percival. “All right, feller,” he says soothingly. “It’s all right. You’re not healed up yet. You need to get a little bit more strength up before you can come out here. Come on then, come on, let’s get you back inside where it’s nice and warm.”

Percival, shocked and suddenly desperately weak, trembling fiercely from the exertion of even this small escapade, allows the wizard to herd him carefully back beneath the tent flap to his blanket. Then, after a moment’s frustrated snarling, at a loss for what to do next, gives in to his gentle but insistent charm work, and allows himself to be ushered back to sleep.

 

*

 

The thing with beasts, Newt thinks, staring thoughtfully down at the paw tracks in the snow, is that you just can’t tell how they’re going to surprise you next. The Jackalope has found a companion, judging by the prints he’s seeing here, so Newt’s suspicions that this area already supports a wild population have been confirmed. What he hadn’t expected was for the pair of them to stick around, particularly considering the presence of Newt’s latest rescue. He hopes Molly isn’t lingering out of the knowledge of the deep stores of food to be found in his case. All the more reason to be on his way as soon as possible, he thinks.

It’s been a week and a half since the jaguar turned up and Newt took him in. In that span he’s dedicated almost the entirety of his free time to an intensive healing regime of spells, potions, and unguents that have brought the beast back up to a fair semblance of good health. Once Newt allows him to wake from his enchanted slumber he’ll be weaker than he wants to be of course, but he’ll be perfectly capable of fending for himself again.

Normally, Newt wouldn’t follow such a demanding plan, but in the interests of releasing the beast back to the wild as quickly as possible he’d thought it best. Although to be honest, what the beast is doing all the way up here is a mystery. Newt pushes himself to his feet and looks down the path leading further in amongst the trees. The weather has turned, the threat of snow gone for another season, and the sky is again a brilliant blue. All around the forest is alive with the tinkle and chime of melting ice, and he thinks he can smell the first stirrings of spring on the air. Yes, now is not an unreasonable time to move his latest guest on.

Since that first escapade Newt hasn’t allowed the jaguar to wake more than to be able to eat his food, charming the beast into submission with a few heavy hunger inclination spells and then immediately putting him back to sleep. He’s still not sure what brought on that bout of strange digging - some kind of fear reaction perhaps? Wild animals can behave erratically when cornered after all. With a sigh he thinks of how delayed his timetable is. The girls are bound to be worrying about him by now, even if he had warned Tina to the best of his ability that things sometimes go wrong in the field, and just not to worry. She’ll still be worrying, he knows it.

No, the jaguar’s strong enough now. Newt will give it another couple of days just to be sure, then he’ll leave the tent flap open, let the beast awaken of his own accord, and allow nature to take its course. Shouldering his backpack, he sets off back to the tent to feed the rest of his beasts.

 

*

 

Percival wakes to the sound of a clock ticking. For the longest moment, he wonders how he has allowed his office to become so cold, and then he opens his eyes and the vision fades. The inside of the wizard’s tent is bright with sunlight, the dripping of snowmelt a constant tick in the background. The tent flaps are drawn back and he can see outside to the clearing and a much reduced layer of snowfall. The trees have shed the majority of their own coverings of ice, and the air is filled with the busy midday arguments of the forest birds. He looks around for his wizard companion, and finds the inside of the tent bare save for the blanket upon which he lies, and a single, battered suitcase lying on its side in the corner. 

Carefully, he pushes himself up into a sitting position, wary of his wounds, only to find any pain has vanished. A quick examination with nose and tongue tells him that his body has been healed completely, the open wounds seamlessly closed up and his bruised and battered legs able to stretch again without pain. It takes him almost a full minute to shake his mind free of the lingering fog of the sleep charms to recall the last time he awoke, and the disaster of communication that had been. He blinks and sneezes, digging his claws into the soft fabric of the blanket and stretching his muscles out with a long curve of his spine. Yes, he remembers now. 

Reaching for his magic, he tests the strength of his reserves and feels a chill go through him as nothing responds. He cannot feel the warm swirl of his power, or the pliant bending of form that comes when he pushes on bone and sinew to change his shape back to human. No magic stirs, and his body remains stubbornly in the form of a jaguar. 

Breaths coming faster now, he remembers his previous plan, and tries to visualise the letters he’ll need to write out a message for his rescuer. Just as with his magic, the shapes and lines slip away into a fog of uncertainty, the concepts gone from his mind. He stands, breathing hard, panic starting to stir in his belly. This is bad; this is incredibly bad. If this is spellshock, or even just a lingering part of the curse, he needs help, and he needs it right now. 

Looking around the tent he raises his nose and sniffs to locate the wizard. His scent is strong here, and mixed in with something odd, but clearly the man himself is absent. The majority of his travelling kit has gone, either vanished or transfigured into something that can fit in that case of his, so clearly, that and the fact Percival has been allowed to wake, indicates the man is intending to leave soon. Well, he can’t. Percival follows his nose, scenting strangeness on the air: smells that don’t make sense for a forest clearing in the middle of nowhere. Other beasts, the smell of manure and potions. Prey animal and predator alike. None of it makes sense. 

He pads to the open tent flap and looks outside, blinking against the bright midday sun. Beyond the clearing the forest is dense, the world filled only with the sounds of wilderness. If there are other beasts out there, or a farm of some kind, it’s within distance of neither his nose nor his ears. Frustrated, Percival turns back inside and stares around. A slow thought occurs, and if he were human he’d grit his teeth. Perhaps the man is a smuggler of some kind? That would hardly help Percival’s cause - to flee one thief only to run straight into the arms of another. But no, it doesn’t make sense! The man has dedicated a truly extraordinary amount of effort to healing him up, and now, apparently, feels happy enough with his progress that he’s left him here with the clear intent that in his absence Percival leave the tent and be on his way. 

Perhaps Percival should simply wait here until the man returns, and then refuse to leave his side until he admits defeat and takes him along with him. Although how he’s travelling Percival’s not sure, he hasn’t seen a broom, but of course he could be out on it right now. And what if he simply charms Percival back to sleep for a spell and while he slumbers takes himself off on his way? Right now he has no magical defence whatsoever and could hardly resist a child’s charm let alone that of a practiced wizard. Growling in frustration, Percival paces a tight circle inside the tent. When the answer occurs to him it does so all of a sudden, and he comes to a halt feeling like a total fool. His  _ documents. _ He’d left them buried at the side of that tree before he went in after Freddie Goodfellow! They’re all made up in his undercover persona’s name, but they should be proof enough to this wizard that Percival is no ordinary jaguar. Certainly not if he turns up and presents them to him. He’ll open them and know at once that Percival is an animagus. 

Satisfied with this plan of action, Percival returns to the clearing and lifts his head to sniff the wind. He has almost no idea how long he’s spent recovering, and it’s clear that between the night of his disastrous encounter with Goodfellow and his awakening today, another few feet of snow has both fallen and already begun to melt. The trail of his passing is most likely entirely destroyed by now, but on the other hand…

It takes him almost an hour of loping through the woods to pick up the scent of the magical tracer he’d laid on Goodfellow, faint enough to have almost vanished, and passing distressingly close to his rescuer’s campsite. Once discovered he must then decide which direction is the most likely to lead back to the cave. But Merlin, Morgana and the Lord Himself must both be looking out for him today, for he chooses correctly, and when the cave comes into sight he near skips in excitement.  _ Bless you, Recon & Analysis team, bless you and your tracking spells, _ he thinks, as he makes his way around the clearing, nose to the snow. He can tell by the intensity of the scent that Goodfellow is long gone, but a cautious attempt to peek inside the cave to see what he’s left behind is thwarted by a surprisingly powerful disinclination spell no doubt put up to keep any further animals from trying to get inside. The touch of it makes Percival feel physically sick, his skin itching with pins and needles, and he knows better than to waste energy trying to penetrate such defences in his current state. 

Circling the cave, he reorients himself, using the mental tricks he’s learned both as an animagus and a field auror, and begins to make his shivering way back through the trees to where he’d buried his package. Now his own stamina and endurance potions have long since worn off, the cold is biting, and even his thick paw pads have gone through the stage of feeling the burning cold of the snow and immediately back out the other side to sheer numbness. A small part of him worries about frostbite, but discipline and need both keep him on course.

He finds the fallen tree with an enormous sense of relief, and sets about digging up his package with great eagerness, the physical activity going some way to maintaining his body temperature. Even so he can feel a drag in his limbs and a frightening emptiness of physical energy reserves as he pushes himself to dig swiftly - the aftereffects of spending Merlin knows how long sleeping on a blanket as he recovered from his wounds. 

With a growl of triumph he finally unearths his prize, and, picking it up in his teeth, pushes aside his fatigue and sets off at a dead run back in the direction of the campsite. It’s been three hours since he left, and the thought occurs to him that this is plenty enough time for an already packed wizard to have gotten well under way. 

Even so, despite the growing drag of weariness in his limbs, it takes him far less time to find his way back to the clearing than it did to get out to his stashing point. The cold is bitter and relentless, and this jaguar form of his is not made for these fierce winter conditions. If he ends up stuck out here overnight for long enough there’s a good chance he’s not going to fare well at all. Percival pushes himself hard, sure of his direction now and desperate not to miss his chance. And yet, even expecting the possibility he still freezes when he finally returns to the clearing to find it empty. 

The snow is disturbed around the area where the tent was once pitched, a large patch of withered green poking through the blanketing white. Every other trace of the wizard’s presence, save for the scent of him lingering on the air, is gone. Percival forces himself into motion, nose to the ground, until he finds the trail of footprints that leads off towards the path between the trees. For whatever reason, it seems as though the man decided to walk the initial distance, and, praying to Morgana that his luck will hold out, Percival, with one eye on the tracks and the other on the forest, sets off in pursuit. 

 

*

 

It’s only because Newt Scamander is chronically incapable of keeping to a schedule that he’s still not quite to his apparition point by the time the jaguar comes barrelling out of the trees towards him. He’d taken his time packing up camp, hovering a little just on the off chance his patient returned, though he’d held off feeding him the last day in the hopes that hunger would drive him out to hunt for himself. Then he’d been sidetracked en route after he’d spotted another set of jackalope tracks which he’d diligently recorded in his notes on the area, including a few sketches of the location for ease of returning later, if there ever was a later. Finally, he’s so engrossed in repacking his sketching materials, stowing them safely and confirming the latches are firm on his case - New York has given him something of a complex about that now - that he doesn’t hear the beast until it’s already bursting from the treeline and almost upon him.

“Bloody hell!” he gasps, almost going over backwards in surprise, scrambling for his wand with hands still full of sketchbooks. 

The jaguar slides to a halt on its haunches not a foot away from him, and Newt yelps, certain that his failure to pull out his wand has resulted in his imminent mauling. But the beast does nothing of the sort, instead it regains its footing and drops something at Newt’s feet before staring up at him with intense yellow-gold eyes. 

“Uhm...all right, feller. No need to get excited...I, uh, what are you-?” Newt takes a hesitant step back and stops the moment the jaguar growls and follows. “It’s all right! Really, I’ll just stay right here, just calm down, friend.”

The jaguar growls at him, reaches down for the packet it’s dropped in the snow and tosses it onto Newt’s boots. Newt, being no fool and experienced in dealing with temperamental beasts that could rip him apart in seconds, looks down with interest, and then, ever so slowly, reaches down to pick it up. As soon as he does so the jaguar backs off a step, and, reassured he’s chosen the correct course of action, Newt begins to examine the packet. 

Although wet with saliva, the small bundle is wrapped tightly with string and some kind of waxed fabric, presumably to keep the contents dry. With half an eye on what the beast is doing, Newt carefully begins to unpick the wrapping, until finally he has in his hands a set of documents and a mixed selection of currency. He sorts through the papers, turning them over, eyebrows raised. One of them is a passport, and he flips this open until he finds the photograph inside. It’s of an older man, grey haired, nondescript, by the name of Alastair Sinclair. Newt looks from this to the jaguar who is watching him intently, and something clicks.

“Oh,” he breathes softly. Suddenly the jaguar’s presence out here makes an awful lot more sense. “You’re a  _ familiar.” _

The jaguar blinks at him, and then makes a sharp, half-squealing cry that Newt reads as frustration. Perhaps he’s right, Newt really ought to have put a lot more thought into why this beast was living all the way out here. “I’m sorry,” he says, going down on one knee to put himself at eye-level with the beast. “I should have thought about this a lot more. I just, I’ve heard of people keeping jaguars as pets and then letting them escape to live wild, and I assumed you’d done just that. I’m sorry, old fellow, I should have known. Is this your master?” 

The jaguar looks from the passport that Newt holds up and then back to Newt with such despair that Newt’s heart aches for the beast. He glances at the passport, wrinkled and old, and to the photograph of the aging wizard Sinclair. “Oh...I’m sorry. Is your master dead? Well, I suppose he does look like he was getting on a bit-”

The jaguar actually snarls at him, and Newt holds his hands up placatingly. “Sorry, sorry, that was crass of me. Is he still around here?”

Newt looks around doubtfully, as though the missing owner of this familiar might miraculously step out from amongst the trees. He’s been here almost three weeks now, and not encountered another soul - what are the chances the man is still in the vicinity? What if he’s hurt, or sick? This area is incredibly remote, the nearest town is well over fifty miles away, and it’s a tiny, podunk little place. On the other hand, familiars are chosen for their intelligence and loyalty; perhaps the beast might lead him to his master. Newt puts a hand on the beast’s neck and it huffs, twisting its head to see what he’s doing. “Easy now. Look, can you take me to your master? Is he hurt? Sick? Does he need help?”

The beast sighs, and for a moment its head-tilt is so human it takes Newt aback. “That’s a no then?” he hazards.

The jaguar head butts him squarely in the chest, and the force of it, although apparently not intended to wound, nonetheless puts Newt flat on his backside in the snow.

“Hey!” Indignant and not a little worried the beast might follow up with something sharper than just a shove, Newt glares at it. “There’s no need to be like that, I was just asking! Come on now, I’ve helped you so far, don’t be an ass.”

They glare at one another, the jaguar huffing in what can only be read as irritation, and Newt none too pleased himself. “Look, I’m not sure what you want from me. If your master isn’t around here, and doesn’t need help, perhaps you should be on your way. I’m going home now, back to New York, and you- oi! Stop it!”

The jaguar has pushed close to him, crowding up against Newt’s chest so that it’s practically sat in his lap. Newt puts his arms up to fend the beast off and finds that it’s got its front paws one on either side of his hips, standing pressed up against him. He goes still, wondering what on earth is going on, and for a few seconds that’s how they stay. After a moment of this ridiculousness, it occurs to Newt that the beast must be expecting to side-along with him; after all, this is pretty much textbook position for transporting large beasts - minus the part where he’s sat on his bum in the snow, that is.  

“Right. Well. I suppose that means you want to come along with me then,” he says drily. 

The jaguar huffs in agreement, and Newt sighs deeply. “Look, get off, we’re not at the apparition point yet. And besides, I have a much better way to carry you than that. That is unless you want to be strapped to the back of my broom, or standing on the end of it - how’s your balance? Cat-like, I assume.”

The jaguar shuffles back with what can only be described as wary suspicion, and Newt clambers to his feet. “I’ve got a wet arse now, thank you ever so much.” 

Another huff. Newt dusts himself off and retrieves his sketchbooks from the snow. Long field experience has them all charmed to be mostly water-resistant, and he rubs them off with the sleeve of his coat, drying the worst bits with his scarf before tucking them into the muggle-worthy compartment of his case. Once they get back into town he’ll pack them away in the main section, but for now he wants them to hand. Not that any creature will be coming near him now he has a jaguar in tow. After a moment’s thought he gathers up Alastair Sinclair’s documents and tucks them in alongside. Finished, he turns back to regard the familiar.

“Right then. It’s about another mile to my apparition point, and that’ll put us straight back into town. From there we’re going on to the next town where I’ve got a bit of business to attend to, and then it’s home to New York by train. Once we get there we’ll have a think about what to do with you. Maybe MACUSA will have records of where your master is, they have records on every other bloody thing. That all right with you?”

The jaguar cocks its head at him, and Newt raises his eyebrows. “Mhm. Don’t you worry. I have a plan for how to get you back with me, but for now I think I want to see how well you’ve healed up. Besides, the walk will do us both good. Come on!”

So saying, Newt picks up his case, pulls his coat back into place, and sets off at a brisk pace through the snow. After a moment, the jaguar follows.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I couldn’t work this into the text, but if it’s not obvious, no, the picture of Alastair Sinclair does not look like Percival. It’s Percival’s transfigured human form for when he’s undercover. 
> 
> Short chapters make for faster updates, I promise! :]


	3. A Night in the Case

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Newt gives his new jaguar a name, and Percival is introduced to the denizens of Newt's case.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah...all right. It turned out longer than expected, etc etc - anyone that’s read anything else I’ve ever written will just be going - _uh huh_ whatever we knew already- in my general direction.
> 
> That having been said, I’ve decided to snip chapter 3 into two parts because I realised I’d got to a logical break point and it means this gets posted sooner rather than later. Faster updates, right? It’s my new motto. Also I can feel myself going -yes but I need to include this too, and _this_ \- and that, friends, is how I end up taking 3 weeks between updates. So, let's not do that and have something to read sooner instead. :]

  
The apparition point is much further than a mile away. By the time they finally stop, Percival is both exhausted and hungry. The wizard has been keeping one eye on him as they travel, and it’s only down to his watchfulness that Percival’s paws have finally thawed out. After a quarter hour of walking the wizard had come to a stop, reached for each of his companion’s feet in turn, and applied a small heating charm to them with a touch of his wand. Despite the obvious indignity of needing someone else’s magic to keep his paws warm, Percival is deeply grateful for the act.  

They’ve trudged for what Percival reckons as closer to three miles when finally the wizard pauses, looks around, and then nods in satisfaction. “Here we go,” he says. “This is the spot.” 

Percival lifts his head wearily from where he’s been following along in the man’s footsteps, and gazes at their destination. They’ve reached a crossroads of sorts, their current trail bisected by another that heads north and south between the trees. In the centre of the intersection an old, fat oak tree lounges, its trunk a winding ripple of ancient wood that lends it an air of strangeness out of sync with the rest of the trees surrounding it. Percival sniffs the air, but can’t scent anything that might indicate a magical aura. 

“Now  _ you _ have to promise to behave,” the wizard continues. Percival watches as he sets his case down on its side and fiddles with the latches. The top flips open and a flood of exotic scents billow out. Immediately Percival can smell other beasts, and not only beasts but plants and potions and the faint hint of cauldron smoke too. He takes a curious step closer, trying to peer around the open lid, and the wizard holds up a palm to fend him off. “Right, no,  _ listen. _ I need you to understand something, all right? This case is my home, and it’s much bigger on the inside than the outside. And what’s more, you’re not going to be the only beast down there. There’s a lot of other beasts too, and they’re all very magical….”

Percival has stopped listening. He stares at the case, and then back up at the wizard’s face. The wizard for his part seems to think that his jaguar companion is merely paying close attention, but the truth is, Percival’s having a minor epiphany. Now that he  _ really  _ looks at the guy, he can make out the points of resemblance. Of course, he’s only ever seen photographs, and the ones clipped to the report had hardly been flattering, but that’s the hair, and that’s the wide, thin mouth, and his face definitely has that same slightly long shape. It’s so much harder in his jaguar form to make sense of human faces though. They all look very broadly the same to a creature designed to pick apart nuance in other jaguars, and it takes a supreme effort of will to match up what his jaguar mind perceives to what his human memories contain. The scent of him though, that makes a lot more sense now.    

_ Newton Scamander. _

Percival remembers “Newt” not only from the many write-ups he’d pored over after his return, but from Theseus Scamander’s association as well. He’s never been close with his counterpart across the ocean, but years of international politicking have granted him a certain degree of familiarity with the other man’s home life. Work in the same arena as another person for almost a decade and picking up little details of their background becomes inevitable.  

Broadly speaking, Percival is aware that he’s only alive today because of Newton’s actions, and it’s something that’s well and truly eaten at him over the last year. Percival Graves is a proud man who’d grown used to the irrefutability of his own power, a complacency that Gellert Grindelwald had soundly beaten out of him. He’s spent the last year salvaging both his reputation and his pride, and nursing his rage over his very public humiliation. And now here is Newton Scamander, yet again, to bear witness to his shame.

“So, if you promise to sleep quietly in the shed I’ll give you some rabbit and apparate us back to town, all right?”

Newton is staring expectantly at him, and Percival blinks. Something about a shed. And rabbit. Ah yes, the case. The reports had described a veritable magical zoo inside, at the heart of which lies the man’s wooden hidey-hole. Apparently he expects Percival to stay down there and be carted around like luggage, which, to be fair, does make a certain amount of sense. It’ll be much easier for them to travel without suspicion if he doesn’t have to hide the presence of what most people will see as a wild predator.  

Percival looks back at the case lying open on its side. If he gets in, that’s it; getting out again under his own power is likely to be extremely difficult. And now that he’s realised who the wizard is, there’s a stubborn, angry part of him that doesn’t want to be rescued for a second time by the strange and eccentric magizoologist. His pride is already monumentally smarting, and he can feel his own reluctance to comply stirring like the threat of an oncoming storm. 

But Newton Scamander is looking at him expectantly, and his look is so full of cautious optimism that Percival feels suddenly like a cad. With an angry snort of air through his nose, he reminds himself bitterly that each time Newton has had occasion to be the cause of his rescue, it’s been due to Percival’s own pride and complacency. 

“All right, feller?”

Percival grits his teeth, and only just manages to prevent himself from snarling. He  _ needs _ this man right now, and that’s all there is to it.

And thus the jaguar that goes stiffly down into Newt’s case is a much more reserved beast than the one that demanded so vehemently to be taken along in the first place. 

 

*

 

It’s surprisingly easy for Newt to once again obtain the same room he’d rented out upon first reaching the town. The old woman who runs the guest house smiles up at him with such genuine pleasure that he feels mildly guilty, and can’t even think why. The place is mostly shuttered up, rooms closed for the winter season, half her house cold and dark. Newt hasn’t quite worked out if she’s of the magical community or not, but he’d gotten her name through some of Tina’s contacts at work, so he supposes she might be. Whatever she is he holds firm to his common sense and presents himself as nothing more memorable than a travel writer exploring the wilds for the sake of a book. It’s very nearly the case anyway, and regardless, just as before she doesn’t press him for detail.

The room is just as he remembers it: small, smelling slightly of damp, with plain wooden furniture, rugs that only mostly cover the floorboards, and a small fire that she sets to burning merrily in the grate for him. Once he’s alone again, Newt sets down his case and takes a seat on the edge of the hard bed. He can feel exhaustion creeping in, and outside the day has already faded almost to dark. Despite the lack of fresh snowfall the weather is still bitterly cold, and he finds himself reluctant to take off his heated coat. He sits for a moment, letting his tense muscles relax, and just listens to the wind whistling its way around the building, making the room wheeze to itself. 

He’ll spend the night here, then, early tomorrow, just after dawn he’ll set out on broomback to the next town over. That place is big enough to have its own train station, and Newt has enough money to purchase a ticket home on one of the wandering slow trains that will eventually, after several layovers, put him back in at New York. It’ll take about a week, and he dearly hopes that in that time the jaguar won’t start to get cabin fever. It’s probably not worth him setting up a habitat for the beast for so short a stay, particularly if he turns out to be as trustworthy as a familiar should be. If he can be left to sleep in the shed overnight he can roam the enclosures with Newt during the day while Newt goes about the usual business of maintaining a case full of beasts.

From what little Newt has seen of him so far the jaguar is startlingly intelligent. It’s been a very long time since Newt had a familiar of his own, not since his Hogwarts days, and even then Sydney had been part-Kneazle. A certain level of intelligence is to be expected in most magical beasts, but it’s a rare muggle animal that displays such an acute understanding of human language. Thoughtfully, Newt pulls off his gloves and lays them out on the bedside table. Maybe he’s reading too much into it. Maybe the beast is simply intelligent enough to understand basic magical routines, primed by an owner that had probably raised him from a cub. Or maybe he’s part-Wampus somewhere back in his ancestry. Honestly, Newt’s come across stranger things.

He gives it half an hour before he bolts the door securely, certain that he’s going to be left in peace for the night, and then makes his way back down into his case. The jaguar is waiting for him, sitting neatly by the shed’s door, his golden eyes watching Newt descend with interest. He seems a little brighter now than he did earlier, much to Newt’s relief. He’d been somewhat concerned that going down into the case had been mildly traumatic for the beast, but looking around now nothing seems disturbed and the beast himself is sitting quite serenely. A glance into the now empty bowl beneath the workbench tells Newt there’s nothing wrong with his appetite at least.

“Hello again,” Newt says quietly, and pulls out the stool from beneath the bench. He sits down and with a flick of his wand sets the kettle to boiling. “I’m going to have some tea. You had enough water?”

The jaguar simply continues to watch him, peaceably enough to Newt’s eye. For a beast that had come so close to death just over a week ago he’s certainly looking very smart now. His coat has healed completely, black fur sleek over muscle, no trace left of the deep wounds that had marred his flanks. Altogether he’s a very handsome beast, and combined with the sharp intelligence in his eyes Newt finds himself unsurprised he’s turned out to be a familiar. 

“You know, I never told you my name, did I?” Newt says, with sudden realisation. “It’s Newt.” He watches the beast carefully, interested to see if the theory that he’s projecting understanding on to the animal holds any merit. The jaguar watches him placidly, still as a statue, and Newt sighs thoughtfully. The kettle starts to whistle, and the next few minutes are taken up with the brewing of tea. All this is watched with cool interest by the jaguar, Newt glancing over curiously every so often to see if he’s still paying attention. Finally, sitting back against the ladder, Newt sips his tea and looks thoughtfully at the beast.

“You need a name,” he says eventually. “It would be rude to keep saying ‘you’ all the time. How about it? Do you have a name?”

There’s something strangely intense about the jaguar’s stare now, as though the beast is committing his features to memory, or perhaps just picking out the best spot to bite his head off. But no, after all these years Newt has a good read on beasts of all kinds, and there’s nothing in this one that suggests aggression of any kind. 

“You are rather smart looking, you know,” he says. 

It’s true. The environs outside the shed have cycled on to their night lighting, and in the warm glow of the lamplight the jaguar’s coat drinks in the light. His fur is so black that Newt can barely see the rosettes that he knows should be there, and his eyes are a golden gleam, a richer colour than Newt has ever seen on a jaguar. He wonders idly if his old master had transfigured him a little. He’d certainly fed him up enough. The beast is genuinely enormous, even for his sex, easily tall enough at the shoulder to almost skim Newt’s waist. Even the slight greying around his muzzle only serves to give the beast a somewhat distinguished air.

“How about...Nox?” Newt says, after a moment’s thought. Nox, the opposite of Lumos, used to extinguish the light. After all, the beast’s coat is dark enough that it gives a strange, depthless effect to his fur, as though he pools the shadows around himself. The jaguar gives a low huff, half-growl, half sigh, and Newt takes it as approval. “Nox it is then,” he says.

Newt raises his tea cup in salute to the new name and drains it dry. “All right, now that’s done, I suppose I ought to set you out a bed so you don’t end up climbing up on the bench. You’ll sleep in here tonight, and we’ll see about how you deal with that. Maybe tomorrow you can go and have a look round outside. I think you’ll like that, there’s lots of interesting things out there.”

The jaguar, Nox, simply watches in silence as Newt packs up his tea kit and pulls out some old blankets, setting them down under his workbench with the clear intention of having his guest sleep on them. Satisfied, Newt takes some time to poke his head outside and confirm all is well with the rest of his beasts, and by the time he’s returned Nox has already curled himself up under the bench. He leaves the jaguar there to sleep, and the last he sees of him before he closes the case’s lid is his golden eyes, watchful and intent, staring back up at him from the shadows. 

  
  


*

  
  


The inside of Newt’s shed smells of herbs and animal feed, smoke, tea and old leather. Percival lets the mixture wash over him as he rests, reminded in a strange way of potions classes during his Ilvermorny days. The scent of beasts is everywhere, and he spends a time trying to pick the strands of their identities apart, working out how many there must be and what varieties. He can hear something that sounds large and lumbering, and a number of cries that he suspects are being made by birds. There’s a muted piping noise: little trills of delicate sound that he knows to be uttered by Mooncalves. They used to have one of those at Ilvermorny, a sweet old thing that had died in his last year at the school, leading to many tears amongst the students, even those a little too old to be bothered by such things. 

Despite his weariness, sleep does not come easy to Percival that night. Every time he begins to drift off another creature makes a sound that brings him out of his doze and fully awake, fur standing on end. Being unable to see what’s out there is putting him on edge, well aware that the incident reports had made great mention of Newt’s cavalier attitude regarding dangerous beasts. He’d gotten up at one point to try and peer out of the tiny window in the door, but the angle is such that he couldn’t see anything more than plants and a large, blank hanging sheet that waved slightly in an unfelt breeze. He’d returned to his blanket ill at ease, and curled himself up tightly, planning dire responses to imagined beast attacks. 

When finally he does drop off to sleep, he only lasts an hour before he’s forced awake by his dreams. He can’t remember what they were about, but he can still smell the salt air, and feel the ice beneath his feet, for a long time after he wakes. Defeated, he gives up on sleep, and settles down to brood instead. 

_ Nox, _ he thinks.  _ Merlin’s balls.  _ Well, it could have been worse. Seraphina had once threatened to out him to the world as “Paddypaws” and to this day she still brings it up from time to time. She won’t, he knows that, but the fact she even threatens it still grates on his nerves.

No, the pool of people who know that Percival is an animagus is one that he keeps deliberately small. Only Seraphina and his most senior aurors know exactly what he is, and only some of them have seen him in his jaguar form. Similarly by dint of their seniority and experience, every auror selected for the Major Crimes team knows, but again, they’re sworn to secrecy and likewise few of them have ever seen him transformed. Indeed there are those who even doubt that he is an animagus, declaring tales of his ability to be the product of gossip spread by certain mischievous souls amongst the inner circle. It was indeed one of his very few victories over Grindelwald: such is the secrecy surrounding Percival’s ability that the world’s greatest dark wizard never even realised he’d missed a trick.

Percival is still bitterly proud of that, much good it did him. That same strict secrecy had led to Grindelwald successfully impersonating him without once making use of an animagus form, and no-one in MACUSA any the wiser for it.

By the time Newt comes back down into the case the next morning, Percival has worked himself into quite a sulk. His paws are sore and his leg muscles ache from the running he’d done yesterday, and he’s still utterly exhausted after a night of barely any sleep. What’s worse he’s been needing to pee for the past two hours, and the last thing he intends to do is abandon all pride and piss in a corner.  _ Absolutely  _ not. Thus when Newt starts down the ladder it’s to be greeted with an impatient snarl and a jaguar that’s already up and wide awake.

“Good morning to you too! Hush now please, I don’t want anyone upstairs to hear you; the old girl’s a bit deaf but knowing my luck... Move over, will you? Breakfast in a second, where are you-? You can’t go out yet-, ah, right. I see, yes fair enough. Come on then.”

Waiting impatiently by the door for the man to stop wittering, Percival could quite happily have taken a swipe at him by the time Newt finally opens up the shed and lets him out. Even so, and knowing what’s likely to be on the other side of the door, he draws up short almost at once. There are actual  _ trees. _ Percival blinks around, taking in the scale of the expansion charms in use, impressed despite himself. A sharp nudge to his backside from Newt’s shin gets him moving again, and he finds himself being herded off round the side of the shed.

After he’s seen to his business, and before he can follow his nose in pursuit of any of the truly fascinating scents that fill the place, he finds himself being summoned back round to the front. Newt has a bowl of meat for him that sets Percival’s mouth to watering, his jaguar body entirely happy to be distracted by food. His mind is busy though, watching as Newt hauls buckets of feed out from a store in his shed - from that trapdoor Percival had noted during the night perhaps.

“Right then,” Newt says, setting down a bucket of pellets, and turning to Percival. “Shall we introduce you to everyone?”

Percival licks rabbit from his lips and thinks,  _ Yes, let’s.  _ Despite a terrible night’s sleep, or perhaps partly because of all the strange cries he’d heard throughout, he feels filled with curiosity about what’s actually out there. Surely in the light of day things will make far more sense. Besides which, jaguar or not, Percival’s an auror and he has a duty to ensure that this magical menagerie is in no way a threat to the general public. 

“Now, stay close to me please, no running off,” Newt says, and Percival thinks his stare is particularly intent today, as though he’s taking a measure of his new companion. Honestly, Percival’s not sure what to make of it, though he supposes Newt would be within his rights to be wary of a creature such as he. Obediently he moves closer, following along on Newt’s heels, for now as meek as a Puffskein.

It’s come to him during the night, that whatever he finds down here, no matter what the youngest Scamander is up to, Percival will simply have to grin and bear it - within reason of course. He just needs the man to get them back to New York, and from there Percival can make his own way. As long as there’s nothing immediately threatening down here he’ll simply keep to himself for the rest of the trip, nose out of things and mouth closed. He’ll make no further attempts to communicate his crisis, and instead he’ll spend his time sleeping in the shed, his entire focus on conserving his energy and fighting off this terrible spellshock.

His resolve lasts as long as the path that leads to the first enclosure. He can smell dung and blood wafting out from within, spiked with the musky scent of predator, and some ancient instinct buried deep inside him stops his paws dead at the foot of the stairs. Newt is carrying two buckets of goat legs up the steps to the habitat, and he glances back at Percival carefully as he continues on up.

“All right now, Nox. These guys won’t hurt you if you don’t threaten them. Come on now, they’re only babies.”

Suddenly there’s a queer trumpeting roar, and a thunderous tumult of sound from inside the enclosure, as of several massive beasts approaching at speed. Percival can feel the boards trembling beneath his paws, and he flattens himself instinctively, tail lashing. Newt disappears into the enclosure with a last look back over his shoulder, and the bellows from within escalate. One part of Percival’s mind understands that this increase in noise is simply the result of beasts eager to meet their handler and his buckets of food, but another, more simple part of him, is reacting to the peculiar cadence of the creatures’ voices, and the way it raises the hackles all along his spine.

The sounds from within drop off to crunching as Newt hands out his burden, and he can hear the man’s voice talking friendly nonsense. Infuriated by his own reaction, Percival takes his courage in hand and forces himself to creep up the steps to peek over the top and inside. 

_ Graphorns _ . He recognises their ugly faces from old school books, though he’s never seen one in the flesh. Newt stands between twin examples of them, rubbing his palm across their flanks and petting them as one might pet an unusually large and eldritch pair of horses. They both turn their tentacled heads towards Percival at the same time, mouths still chewing on their bones, and only by great effort of will does Percival not snarl back at them. Provoking the beasts seems like the most unwise of plans right now, particularly with Newt stood so close beside them. They could trample him in an instant were they to knock him from his feet. 

“All right you two, this is Nox, he’s new and you’re not to bother him. Nox, this is Bertie and Gwyn, they’re brother and sister and only two years old. Once we’re done in New York I’m taking them back to the mountains to release them. You three need to get along now.”

The Graphorns stop chewing as one, and the weight of their predatory gazes is awfully heavy. Percival doesn’t show them his teeth, but he’s sorely tempted to. If they charge him he could leap out of the way, and despite their bulk he could probably get on their backs with ease and bring them down with a bite to the back of the neck - if he can get through their infamously tough hide that is.

“ _ Nox _ ,” Newt says, and although his tone is mild it’s quite clearly a warning. A little surprised, Percival shifts his gaze to him. It’s been a long time, years in fact, since anyone used a voice like that on him. He’s startled by just how effective it is. Newt dips his chin and raises an eyebrow at him, and still a little bewildered by his own response, Percival shuffles his paws and holds his peace.

Satisfied, the Graphorns flick their tentacles in Percival’s direction, then with all the magnificent arrogance of the truly powerful apex predators, turn their backs on him, nudge Newt in friendly farewell, and then canter off to the far recesses of their enclosure. Percival watches them go, and then slowly rises from his defensive crouch. 

_ “Smug bastards,” _ he says after them, and it comes out as an affronted snarl. 

Newt picks up the empty buckets, setting them one inside the other, and gives Percival a friendly scratch on the head as he walks past. “There you go, that wasn’t so bad, was it?”

Still out of sorts, Percival isn’t quick enough to duck away from his scritching fingers, and the indignity of it is achieved before he can even respond. Newt is past him and down the stairs, already on his way to the next enclosure and calling him to follow. 

The rest of the beasts are not quite so fearsome, although there are enclosures that reek of creatures no wizard should attempt contact with. Percival is well aware that at one point the man was transporting a goddamned  _ Nundu _ \- he’s seen the paperwork for it - but the habitat that once contained it is stale with its scent, and empty. 

On the whole, Newt’s portable sanctuary is much emptier of passengers than Percival remembers reading, which must mean that he’s relocated them elsewhere. Where that might be Percival almost doesn’t want to think about. Still, it’s his job, and as they make the rounds he makes a mental tally of the beasts on display, ticking them off against the ones he remembers from the reports. The Jarvey is new, the Marmite is bigger but still present, the Erumpant is gone, as are the Nundu and the parents of the young Graphorns. There are several miscellaneous others that he tries to keep track of, but in the end despite the much reduced numbers, the list becomes so long that he knows he’s not going to remember it all.

The Niffler though, the Niffler is still there. It comes to the edge of its little habitat and stares hard at Percival, beady eyes locked on to him. Its plump little body gleams with soft, dark fur, and Percival is gripped by the sudden overwhelming desire to seize it in his mouth and eat it. He pushes the jaguar thoughts back down with effort and turns away, following Newt back towards a shadowy, dim-lit corner that must be where the night enclosures are. There’s a sweet trilling echoing out from within, a piping choir that starts up a pretty melody at the sound of Newt’s footsteps. 

_ Mooncalves,  _ he realises with more fondness than he’d expected of himself. 

They have to spend some time with Percival standing well back, then lying down, then sitting unobtrusively, to prove he’s not a threat before the herd will even come close. When they do they still watch him nervously, gimlet eyes huge and wary, yet entirely oblivious to the presence of the human in their midst. Percival’s honestly impressed by the ease with which Newt moves around his creatures, and the way that each and every one of them, from the shyest prey animal to the most ferocious predator, seems to have some strange blind spot when it comes to the man’s presence. No fear, no distrust, just an acceptance the level of which one expects from pets, not wild beasts. 

As they make their way around the case, Newt keeps up a near constant patter of talk, some of it to himself, most of it to his creatures, and a not insignificant amount aimed at Percival himself. He suspects it’s an attempt to keep him calm, but after that first encounter with the Graphorns Percival has managed to maintain a much better grip on his reactions. It’s quite an effort of will really, because, despite himself, this place is honestly fascinating. It’s like being back in the labs at Ilvermorny with the somewhat eccentric old magizoology professor and his team of enthusiasts. They’d never had access to beasts like this of course, and their examples had mostly been either illusionary or photographic, but their rooms had been packed with strange equipment, with books and minor beasts and evidence of such beasts. How they’d have loved it here, he thinks, looking around. 

And the scents of the place, they’re simply intriguing. For an animagus whose territory is by necessity mostly that of the city he protects, the sheer range of new and exotic scents is almost overpoweringly fascinating. There are several occasions where he finds that he’s stopped to sniff at something, only to realise he’s fallen behind and is being called onwards by Newt. And it’s not just beasts, it’s plants too. The likes of which he knows a few people back at the office would pay very good money to get a look at - and not because they’re illegal either, just…. _ interesting. _

“So Molly’s one of what we call the Winter Jackalopes. They live much further north even than where we’ve come from, but there’s populations all over this area. They’re the only Jackalope species where the females have antlers as well as the males.”

Percival has no idea who Molly is, and he can’t see anything rabbity and antlered in the immediate vicinity, so he simply pads along next to Newt in silence, listening. He’d always been fond of the magical beasts class at school, although he’d never taken it further than what was required for auror training. Even to a wizard such as he, magical beasts have always held an exciting sense of the mysterious and mystical, albeit in a manner best enjoyed by children, and left behind by adult sobriety. Still though, there’s no-one here to think ill of his interest and he lets himself feel the thrill of the topic without too much guilt.

By the time they make their way back round to Newt’s shed, Percival’s body is positively aching. It would seem his physical reserves as well as his magical are still sorely depleted, and it’s with some relief he slumps down at the foot of the shed’s steps, resting his head on his folded paws and closing his eyes briefly to listen as Newt packs away his feeding kit. He hears Newt take a seat next to him on the stairs, then feels fingers on the top of his head. With sudden shock he realises that the man is giving him an  _ ear  _ scritch. 

Touching an animagus in their animal form has very different connotations than touching a favoured pet, or even a familiar, and for a second Percival freezes in mingled shock and embarrassment. He can count on the fingers of one hand the number of people he’s ever allowed to give him an ear rub in his jaguar form, and most of  _ those _ are blood relations. 

Newt seems to read his surprise, for he gives Percival’s head a soothing stroke before he just carries on with a soft, “All right, feller, there’s nothing here to worry about, is there?”

Uncomfortable, Percival ducks his head away. Not fast enough to be aggressive, but enough that Newt doesn’t push the issue. He doesn’t want to offend the man, but he’s also not a pet, and he’s not really comfortable with being treated like one. Still, he doesn’t exactly want to be labelled as difficult either; best they both get along smoothly in the interests of Percival’s being able to get back to MACUSA with as much speed as possible once they reach New York. 

“Right. I’m going to set up some charms around Frank’s old enclosure, and you’re going to sleep in there today. It’s not very pretty right now but it’s clean and you’ll have space to move around and do your business. Better than being in the shed all day I think. I’ll put you some water down, and I’ll be back later to check up. Sound all right?”

It sounds like a plan at least, and Percival is glad to not be facing another full day confined to the interesting but ultimately cramped confines of Newt’s little laboratory. He allows himself to be herded into the empty habitat directly in front of the shed, looking around at the billowing white canvas sheets that mark its boundaries, then up at what must have been the Thunderbird’s old perch. With a flick of his wand Newt transforms the stone column into wood, then, with a thoughtful frown, changes its shape so that there’s a long, thick branch jutting out from the side. “Somewhere for you to lie, yes?” he says to Percival, whose legs have already begun itching with the desire to leap up to this new vantage point and settle down. 

Newt leaves him with the information that he’ll be flying them to the next town along this morning in order to catch a train this evening, and another promise to return later. Once he’s gone Percival explores the limits of his new home, wrinkling his nose at the disinclination charms that keep him penned in, but unwilling to test them. He can feel their effects prickling across his skin, making his fur stand on end, and it frustrates him to find that still he cannot summon up any kind of magical response to challenge them. With deliberate care he pushes aside the rising swell of alarm growing in his breast, and turns his thoughts away from what it means. There’s nothing he can do about it now.

Eventually he gives in to his body’s desire to find the highest spot, and climbs his way up the transfigured perch to the perpendicular section, whereupon he stretches himself out on his makeshift branch, settles his head on his paws, and finally manages to drift off to sleep.

 


	4. Living With Beasts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Percival settles in, Newt chatters, and the biggest snake in the history of snakedom introduces himself. [No Bowtruckles were harmed in the making of this chapter.]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thursday update! Thank you very much to everyone who's read or commented or left kudos - your encouragement has been truly amazing. :]

 

 

In a very short space of time a routine begins to develop. In the mornings and the evenings Newt comes down to visit his creatures and see to their needs. He seems to spend most of the day up above, although from time to time he pokes his head down to check on his newest guest with what Percival surmises is an increased level of caution. He seems entirely satisfied by what he finds, and for his part Percival does his utmost to give him no immediate cause for concern. He spends his time in Frank’s old enclosure, sleeping mostly, but also pacing when the need takes him, listening to the trickle of water from somewhere off behind and wishing for access of his own to a water source large enough to bathe in.

Boredom quickly becomes an issue, one that Newt appears to pick up on despite Percival’s best efforts to remain the model guest. He invites Percival to accompany him on his rounds, even adding in an extra hour at midday during which he tinkers at his outside bench, while Percival wanders the vicinity and pokes his nose into the most interestingly scented corners. Although he does his utmost to keep his eyes away from the ladder leading to the outside world, Percival is nonetheless desperate to know how far along their journey they are. Since Newt had mentioned trains on that first day, Percival guesses they’re either taking an indirect route or have caught one of the slow, cheap options, stopping at every available backwater location and perhaps even overnighting at some of them. Although Percival is no expert on No-Maj travel, having travelled here via broom on the way out, he’s certain a fast train to New York would have had them in the city by now.

It takes two days before Newt gives him a restricted run of the place. Apparently, stable extension charms take him some time to cast safely, and the ones in Frank’s enclosure, still in place even now, go upwards rather than outwards, and although Percival appreciates a nice high perching spot there are limits to his enjoyment unless he intends to manifest his own pair of wings. So Newt opens up the disinclination charms at the front of the enclosure, pushing their bounds back along the paths around the side, and out around the courtyard in front of his shed. It gives Percival line of sight to nearly every other habitat, and a circle around his own central enclosure that he can patrol, as well as access into and around the shed itself - something that piques his interest as a potential place of quiet exploration now he’s somewhat less tired and ill at ease.

His new territory even incorporates the burrows of both the Niffler and the Jarvey, although Newt has warned him that should he disturb either one of them the Jarvey will set up such a hue and cry that everyone on the train will know about it, not just Newt. Determined not to set either of them off, Percival instead takes to sitting under the beautiful Abiascus tree, with its copper leaves and faint, tinkling treesong that wraps around him and encourages him to doze. It is, all in all, not an awful way to spend a trip home.

Despite Newt’s earlier concern regarding the mixing of magical and non-magical beasts, the rest of the case’s inhabitants seem to settle down to Percival’s presence with minimal fuss. Newt declares them all remarkably good sports for it, but Percival privately wonders if they’re not simply more observant than their well-meaning but strangely oblivious keeper. The Demiguise for one watches him with knowing eyes, though when he tries to approach the beast it quickly fades from sight and goes on its way. He doesn’t try to pursue, wary of giving Newt any cause to restrict his movements.

And Newt, Newt appears torn between cautious optimism and carefully controlled enthusiasm for Percival’s presence. His efforts to conceal his interest in his new jaguar companion might have been successful had Percival been any ordinary jaguar, but as it is he can clearly read the poorly veiled excitement Newt has developed for his presence. He suspects that he has become the man’s latest project, and honestly he can’t fault him for that. A genuinely well trained familiar can be eye-wateringly expensive, particularly one as exotic and uncommon to the Western wizarding world as a jaguar. To apparently stumble upon one, masterless and in need of a new home, is a tempting opportunity for any wizard, let alone one that thrives on unusual beasts and might have need of a familiar with a little more physical clout than, say, a tabby cat or a bird.

If nothing else, Percival’s time down in the case opens his eyes to the living dragot hoard that it contains. Some of the beasts down here are truly priceless for their rarity and the ingredients one might extract from their bodies, living or otherwise. The Demiguise alone is worth a small fortune in the right circles. Fascinated despite himself, Percival paces along beside Newt as the man makes his rounds, watches him tend his charges with gentle patience and the utmost disregard for his safety, and only the one time makes a complete fool of himself.

The morning that Newt had first shown him round the case, they’d stayed out of the caves. Percival hadn’t questioned this, assuming them to be either storage or empty of life. However this time Newt heads on down into the dark, and Percival pads along behind him, wrinkling his nose at the dusty, musky scent of snake. The man turns out to have a Runespoor. Of course he does, Percival remembers now, though he’d read there were two a year ago. He’s waiting for Newt to finish wiping the beast down with a damp rag - something Percival didn’t even know you did to snakes, or maybe it’s just for Runespoors - when he senses movement at the back of the cave. He’d been wondering how far back this enclosure went, and the answer when it comes, is alarming.

The biggest snake Percival has ever seen in his life, so enormous he at first mistakes it for a dragon, comes shooting out of the shadows at the back of the cave, heading directly for Newt. Without hesitation, Percival leaps forward with a roar, hoping to distract the giant beast, and maybe get his claws into one nose deep enough to draw the other two heads from their target. He knows the creature is so large that he’s going to have to be fast and vicious, and inflict enough damage with his claws that the pain will drive it back.

“Sydney! _No!_ Nox! _Back down!_ ”

Newt’s voice rings out across the cave, making the stalactites shiver with the sound. The giant Runespoor draws back sharply, up out of reach, and Percival slides to a halt on his haunches between it and Newt, his back to the wizard. His growling is that of alarm, a dire threat to the beast hanging above that he’s still ready to take its nose off if it comes any closer.

“All right, enough, the pair of you! Sydney, back off, go on! Back to your corner, Nox- _Nox,_ that’s enough. He’s not going to bite!”

Percival is only half listening, his attention still fixed on the huge predatory snake above them. He lacks Newt’s faith in the beast’s good intentions, having only seen it swoop in for what he saw as an attack, and as such he backs off into the wizard, herding him back further into the protective shelter of the entrance corridor where such a large snake cannot fit.

“Nox, Nox, all right, it’s all right, he’s not coming after us, Nox...Sydney, look what you’ve done. You stay up there now. All right feller, we’ll go outside again.”

Out in the warm artificial sunlight, Percival turns a circle around Newt, checking him over out of habit, his jaguar body moved to scent him as the best way to discover injury. There’s none, although Newt tolerates this inspection patiently. Percival can still feel his heart hammering from the adrenaline spike of the encounter, his sudden shock starting to turn to anger now he has Newt back out in the open.

“What the fuck are you thinking keeping that damned thing in there without a cage? It could have eaten the both of us!” he snarls up at Newt. “It’s a wild beast for Morgana’s sake!”

Newt takes his snarling in stride, crouching down slowly and reaching out a careful palm to touch Percival’s flank as he paces a circle around him. “All right, Nox, you’re safe now, there’s no need to fuss,” he says soothingly.

“Fuss? I’ll give you fuss, you feckless bastard!”

To a human ear, Percival’s ranting is a string of unhappy snarling that climbs dangerously close to a howl. Newt keeps still and lets him pace, but holds out an arm as he comes round again, hooking the jaguar’s head towards him so that his pacing turns inwards towards Newt’s chest.

“Don’t touch me!” Percival snaps.

“Come on now, I know he made you jump, but it’s just his way of playing. He wasn’t going to bite either of us. Sydney’s too old for that sort of thing. He just moves a bit fast sometimes, that’s all.” Newt has gotten his arm around Percival’s shoulder and his fingers in his ruff, scratching a soothing pattern into the jaguar’s neck. “Come on now,” he says, drawing Percival in closer so that he can rest his chin on top of the jaguar’s broad head.

Percival, starting to feel the fury draining away now to leave behind a cold, shaky feeling in his legs, huffs angrily in Newt’s embrace, and only just begins to recognise the calm in the wizard’s voice. He’s not even remotely alarmed by any of this, Percival realises. The man is genuinely without concern, and honestly believes all this is one big misunderstanding. He feels Newt’s other hand come up to rub along his neck and down his shoulder, big soothing motions that wipe away the crackle of tension in his fur. Newt turns his head sideways and presses his cheek into the top of Percival’s head, between his ears. “All right, hush now, it’s all fine now, isn’t it? Aren’t you a brave protector, hm?”

That seals it for Percival. “Oh, fuck off, Scamander,” he growls.

With a wriggle, Percival extracts himself from Newt’s embrace, and stalks off towards Frank’s enclosure. Newt lets him go without a word, and Percival spends the rest of the day up on his perch, far out of reach, deliberately ignoring the stupid magizoologist and his ridiculous death wish, and absolutely not annoyed at all when Newt chooses diplomatically to leave him in peace.

  


*

 

“Now, Tom, come on, don’t be like that! Poppy... _Poppy_...I mean it. I’m not going to tell you all again. You’re to play nicely with each other, or there will be consequences! No, no he’s not. Pickett had to come along with me to look at the door, you know that. None of you like leaving the tree, and that’s perfectly all right. Pickett’s done this before so he was- no come on, don’t be like that…”

Percival listens with half an ear as Newt prattles on to his little family of Bowtruckles - four males, two females, as Newt had told him. It used to be five and one, but then Titus had turned out to be more of a Tit _a_ than a Tit _us_ , and that had only come to light due to the squabbling of Tom and Marlow, and it had been around that point Percival had stopped listening. The little beasts live on a tree that Newt’s kept warded from Percival’s investigations, possibly because he doesn’t trust him not to use the thing as a scratching post. Quite right too, Percival had thought. Those little beasts are entirely illegal, permits or not, and he’d be very interested to know why they’re still present in Newt’s case a year on.

It’s been four days now since they left the north, and Newt is talking about going into town to buy fresh meat. From this Percival guesses they’re overnighting somewhere, perhaps changing trains for some reason, and he does his utmost not to think about why. He can’t control what Newt gets up to out there in the wider world, or influence why he’s decided to take this particular route home. All he can do is sit tight and wait to get back.

“I thought you might appreciate some mutton,” Newt says to him on his way past, bending down briefly to scratch the top of his head. Percival grunts a response at the touch, resigned by now to the constant attempts at petting, and feels his mouth water. Ridiculous really what pleases his palate in this form. As long it’s raw and fresh he’s entirely happy. However, put anything he’s eaten in the past week in front of him as a human and he’d have likely lost the contents of his stomach.  

“I’m off out for the day, but I’ll be back this evening. You all behave!” Newt pauses at the door to his shed and looks around. “Keep an eye on them, Nox.”

Percival lifts his chin from his paws and tilts his head in Newt’s direction. He flicks the tip of his tail in acknowledgement, and Newt appears to understand, for he nods and then departs up the ladder to the outside world. Percival watches him go, listening hard for any indication of what lies beyond the ceiling trap door, but hearing nothing of use. _Patience,_ he tells himself, and puts his head back down to rest.

It’s well towards mid-afternoon before Percival truly finds need to stir. He’s already idly watched the Niffler creep out of his burrow, across the yard and into the shed, to spend a good ten minutes scratching away at the underside of the trap door in a vain attempt to escape. As slippery as the beast may be, like every other time he’s seen the creature make this attempt, it once again fails. Percival stares balefully at it, and ignores the chittering it sends his way, clearly something crude, as it mopes back to its burrow in defeat. This ritual is apparently a daily occurrence, and he supposes he should admire the beast’s optimism if nothing else.

What brings him out of his dreamless dozing, some time towards 3pm by his estimation, is the chitter and skitter of tiny creatures. Percival opens one eye to see three of the Bowtruckles hurrying their way across the dusty yard, up the steps of the shed - where the door lies open to admit Percival should he wish to curl up under the desk - and into the gloom beyond. Percival raises his head sharply, watching them with narrowed eyes. Their movement is hurried and darting, and it makes his muscles itch to ready themselves for a pounce. He watches with growing unease as they clamber their way up the ladder and disappear beyond where he can see. Rising to his feet he creeps to the edge of Frank’s enclosure and then stealthily down the steps until he can get a line of sight to the creatures.

The three of them are gathered on the very top rung of the ladder, poking at the trapdoor with their spindly little fingers. Head tilted, Percival sits down to watch, both amused and confused by what they’re attempting. All traces of amusement vanish however, when moments later the trapdoor gives a click, and the lid of the case opens up. Immediately the three Bowtruckles are up and over the edge, vanishing from sight. Percival leaps to his feet, mouth open in surprise, and then scrambles towards the shed at speed. Those beasts cannot be allowed to escape, not least because they’re highly illegal. Visions of the madness of last year flash through his head as he leaps into the shed and up the ladder. A jaguar’s natural climbing ability is almost without compare, and he’s up the ladder and out through the trapdoor in moments.

He emerges into the watery sunlight of a damp-smelling bedroom, and the three Bowtruckles turn as one to regard him, tiny mouths open in shock. Percival takes in the scene at a glance and knows that he’s going to have to be extremely fast. The Bowtruckles are clumped together not far from the case, and he leaps out in a graceful pounce, intending to pin as many of them as he can beneath his paws. The Bowtruckles shriek in horror at the sight of the enormous predator bearing down on them, but they’re not fast enough to scatter. Percival catches two of them under one paw, feeling their spiky little bodies stab into his paw pads, trying not to damage them while still keeping them in his grasp. The third turns and screams at him before launching an attack directly at his face, jabbing its claws into his nose hard enough to draw blood. Percival roars and spins his hind quarters round, the movement knocking the case sharply enough that the lid closes with a sharp click, latches and locking charms snapping back into place.

The third Bowtruckle backs off, limbs waving, as Percival snaps at it. He doesn’t mean to hurt it, but the damned thing almost took out his eye with that last jab, and he can already feel the other two squirming under his paws, stabbing at his feet with their needley little claws. “Get back in the case, you little bastard!” Percival snarls, already entirely out of patience with this whole fiasco. “Back in the case, or I swear I’ll eat your friends!”

The pain in his nose and paws is sharp and biting, and he can feel blood dripping from his face. The last thing he’d likely do is eat one of these little horrors, but his nose feels like it’s on fire with pain, and he can’t quite remember if these creatures are venomous or not - it certainly feels like they are. The one that’s free of his grasp, he has no idea what it’s called, makes an aborted attempt at staring him down, then, seeing the flash of his teeth and hearing the muffled cries of its companions, hurriedly sets to re-picking the lock on the case. Percival watches it work and eases his weight off the two trapped beneath his paws, just fractionally. Immediately they start to try and wriggle their way free, and he snarls at them in an attempt to frighten them into submission. It works, but it also makes the other one cower and stop what it’s doing.

“Come now, get that case open, and get back inside,” Percival says, slightly more gently now, though it still comes out with all the aggression of a jaguar’s grumbling. There’s nothing he can do about that though, a jaguar is hardly made for nurturing tiny prey creatures. The one by the case shrieks at him and points at its friends.

“I have no idea what you’re saying,” Percival growls, tail lashing in irritation. “Open the case and get back inside.”

It wheezes at him again, making a gesture that does very obviously mean it’s not going to comply unless he lets its friends go. Percival settles back with a sigh, shifting so that he has a Bowtruckle beneath each front paw, and shakes his head. “Look, I don’t know why you guys have come out here, but I can’t allow you to go roaming around. You need to get back in the case, and I’m sorry, little guy, but I don’t think you’re going to do that if I let these two go. You need to work with me here.”

It stares at him, trembling with outrage, and shakes its head defiantly. Percival sighs. His nose hurts something awful, but the situation is somewhat under control now. He almost regrets the haste with which he acted; the pounce had perhaps been a little too aggressive, but it’s hard not to come across as such when the objects of your hunt are so very small and fast, and you are so very large and predatory. “Come on now,” he says, kindly. “You three go back in the case and we’ll say no more of this, hm?” An untruth perhaps because once they’re back in New York and Percival’s back in his human form he’s going to be having _words_ with Mr Scamander about these creatures.

Regardless, it doesn’t work. The Bowtruckle huddles down next to the side of the case and refuses to continue. The one under his right paw has gone still, but the other one is valiantly trying to pull its way out from beneath the press of his foot. Percival looks down at it, and it goes still. “If I let you go join your friend, will you open that case and get in?” he asks it, not believing for a second that it will. It stares at him, and then nods. This is absolutely not a good idea, but Percival’s somewhat at a loss as to what to do. If only he had his magic this would all have been over in seconds.

“Don’t make me eat you, little guy,” he tells it, and lifts his paw. Immediately the Bowtruckle slides out from beneath and scurries across to the case, where it begins pulling at the latches, and poking them with its claws. Its companion remains resolutely huddled next to it, glaring at Percival. Satisfied for now that those two are suitably occupied, Percival risks stealing a glance at the one still beneath his paw. He lifts his foot slightly, to find it curled up in a tangle of leafy limbs, so that he can’t tell which bit of it is what. Carefully he sniffs at the ball of twigs and then rears back with a snarl as a tiny claw pokes right up his nose. The Bowtruckle is gone in an instant, skittering across the floor to join its companions, and the three of them huddle by the case jeering at him.

Percival is on his feet now, nose dripping blood once more and throbbing unbearably. It’s in his mind to jump on the trio and give out a few bites, but he reins that animal aggression in, and settles back down with a low snarl instead. “ _Fine_ ,” he growls at them. “The three of you can sit there and we’ll all wait for Newt to come back.”

And so they do.

The light from outside has long since grown dim, and Percival is both bored and tired of the piss-damp smell of this dingey room, by the time he hears someone approach and Newt’s voice whisper an unlocking charm.

“Nox! What on- Poppy? Marlow-what is going on here?”

Hurriedly, Newt steps inside and pushes the door closed behind him with a shove of his foot. His arms are weighed down by two heavy burlap sacks, and Percival can smell tea and cake, and the promised mutton from earlier. He turns his sore, itching nose to Newt, and says, “About damned time!”

“You three,” Newt says, and the tone of his voice makes the three Bowtruckles hunker down in response. Percival had already read their intentions from the movements of their spindly little limbs - they’d fully planned to try and accuse him of something, he’s sure - but under the weight of Newt’s regard they positively wilt. “What have you done? No, don’t you dare try that, there’s no way Nox could have gotten that lid open by himself! You broke out! And look at Nox’s nose! Just look at it! Right, this is absolutely unacceptable. Pickett, this is what happens when they get jealous, no don’t deny it. I’m very upset with all three of you. Come on, back in the case! Yes, I see - you got out, but you couldn’t lift the lid to get back in, well whose fault is that? Oh, you have a bruise? Well, you should have thought about that before you tried to escape, shouldn’t you? No, you don’t blame Nox, Nox was just doing his job.”

Percival retreats a step and lets Newt take control of the situation, feeling mildly better about it all to hear the man lecture them. He can see a fourth Bowtruckle, the one called Pickett, peeking out from Newt’s top pocket, wagging its claws disapprovingly at the others. The rest of them scurry down into the case once Newt opens it up for them, and, after a last look around at the room, Percival follows them, letting the magic squeeze him through the lid and down the ladder.

He stays in the shed as Newt sees to the Bowtruckles, but he can hear the man chiding them constantly, and snorts at their tiny squeaks of chagrin. His nose is throbbing terribly, and he has to keep snorting blood out to keep his breathing clear. The little bastards were hardly without their defences, he thinks, as he licks at the wounds around his paws.

Newt turns up again shortly afterwards, and moves the sacks he’d brought down up onto the bench. Percival gets a waft of mutton from one of them, and can’t help but follow the sack’s progress.

“All right then,” Newt says, kneeling down next to him. “There’s something nice for you for tea, but let’s see about your nose first, shall we?”

Percival lies patiently while Newt gently cleans the cuts on his nose with a wet rag, and applies a sweet-smelling ointment to them. He lets a little bit of healing magic sort out the worst of the damage, but, as he tells Percival, since he’s already undergone so much magical healing recently it would be unwise to force his body to endure even more. Percival understands the theory, and since the ointment is pleasantly numbing he can’t bring himself to mind.

“Don’t lick it off,” Newt tells him, and then sees to unpacking his purchases.

Afterwards they go on the evening rounds. Percival waits while Newt does a brief mucking out, though he’s learnt in recent days that a significant portion of that job is handled by the two enormous dung beetles that live around the enclosures. Newt seems distracted as he feeds the beasts, and Percival watches him carefully, wondering what’s wrong. He has the look of a rabbit grazing in fox territory, but for the life of him Percival can’t see anything amiss down here.

Once they’re done Newt sits on the steps of the shed with his own dinner, Percival chewing on a leg of mutton at his feet. The lid of the case is open above, which Percival guesses means that Newt is keeping an ear out for something. He can feel the man watching him as he crunches through his sheep bone, and turns his bloodied muzzle up to return the look. Newt is finishing off a piece of that sweet cake he could smell from earlier, and looking distracted.

“What’s up?” Percival asks him idly, well aware that the other wizard won’t understand.

Newt doesn’t reply, just rubs the toe of his foot along Percival’s shoulder. Percival suppresses a sigh. The man is so damnably tactile, and he knows he doesn’t mean anything by it. In truth it’s mostly Percival’s own personal code that stops him from simply going along with it all. Wearing his jaguar form comes with an entirely different set of definitions for what is socially acceptable, with many things framed entirely differently than when experienced as a human. As a jaguar he considers physical contact to be intimate only if another jaguar is involved, and even then only in very specific circumstances. Physical contact with a human, male or female, evokes no carnal interest in him whatsoever, and it’s only the preconceptions of his higher human mind that keep him nervous of such things. Still, regardless of his form Percival is still himself: Percival as a human is a truly reserved man, and as a jaguar he is no different.

“How about you sleep upstairs with me tonight, Nox?” Newt says suddenly, and Percival, startled from his train of thought, blinks owlishly at him for a moment.

“I’m not so sure of this town,” Newt continues. “I didn’t stay here the first time round, and since I went out today I’m starting to feel it’s not very welcoming. The door’s all locked up tight, but I wouldn’t mind a bit of company still. What do you think, hm?”

So that’s what’s wrong with you, Percival thinks to himself. Well far be it from him to deny the man any protection he might seek to claim. After all, he’s Percival’s train ticket home; the least he can do is keep him in one piece long enough to get there.

That night Percival takes up station alongside Newt’s bed, stretched out on the bare, dusty boards of the cheap hotel room. The place smells old and damp, and vaguely of something worse, though he refuses to try and identify what. He can hear the sounds of a fight going on somewhere outside and down the street, a drunken brawl filled with shouted obscenities that wouldn’t have seemed out of place in some of the tougher areas of his city. He wonders what it was that set Newt to worrying about security and thinks perhaps a town like this might not take too kindly to a man like Newt. It doesn’t pay to be different in places like this.

Above him Newt sleeps fitfully, and wakes often. Percival cannot purr, his jaguar form doesn’t have the throat for it, but every time he reckons the man awake he makes a little huff of sound to reassure him of his continued presence. Occasionally Newt reaches down a hand to find the top of Percival’s head, and gives his ears a gentle scratch before he drifts back off to sleep. Caught up in the task of guarding, Percival for once allows it.

  


*

 

A successful magizoologist’s career is made up of observation and the interpretation of said observations, and true to form, Newt had quickly noticed Percival’s interest in the sound of running water echoing from behind Frank’s enclosure. He’d watched as the jaguar investigated the tiny waterfall, and then disappeared off into rafters of his shed to hook out an old tin bath. A quick enlargement charm, a canteen of water, and another bit of charmwork later, and he’d produced a passable bathing pool for his guest. After all, he’d said to Percival, I know you jaguars like to swim.

Now it’s the evening of the day after their stopover, and Percival lies on his back in the yard, letting the artificial sunlight dry his belly fur off. Newt is working at his outdoor bench, mashing bitter-smelling leaves into a potionable form. Occasionally he looks up, watching Percival turning himself to catch the warmth. It’s somewhere close to seven in the evening, and although it’s bitter winter above where their train rattles ever onwards across the landscape, down here keeps to its own seasonal schedule.

Percival lets his eyes drift closed, feeling the warmth seep through to his bones, lifting the ache that’s settled into them, and filling him with sleepy satisfaction. His belly is full, and he’s both warm and content after a good swim in Newt’s makeshift pool. Percival calls it exercise, and Newt hasn’t yet slipped up and called it play, so they’re still at peace with one another on that front. Drifting, he listens to Newt’s chattering.

He talks. Merlin, but he _talks_ . Theseus and the post-incident reports had all in their various ways referred to Newt as an “awkward” man, prone to silences, sullen or otherwise, but Percival’s seen none of that about him. As far as he can tell Newton Scamander keeps up an almost constant running commentary on what he’s doing whenever he thinks he has an audience to listen to him. And it’s not even banal chatter, it’s fascinating little insights into whatever he’s doing at the time. At least Percival has grown to think so anyway. If you actually stop and bother to _listen_ to him, the man is a goldmine of interesting details.

Right now the man’s talking about New York, and how they’re only two days out. This information makes Percival prick up his ears, relieved to learn they’re still somewhat on track. As much as he enjoys a full belly and a pleasant break from work, he has a job to be getting on with and a thief to catch, one that’s in dire need of a sharp lesson. Not to mention the spellshock that still grips him. Percival’s magical reserves are still stubbornly empty, and he’s starting to think with some alarm that there’s more to this condition of his than simple magical drain.

“You’ll be able to meet Tina and Queenie,” Newt says. “I’m sure you’ll like them, they’re both very nice.”

_Hm,_ Percival thinks, _that is actually a rather good idea. Tina will certainly know me for what I am._

Tina’s reinstatement as an auror had come soon after the debacle that had been Grindelwald’s uncovering, and within a week of his return to work a month later Percival had promoted her to Major Crimes. The appointment had the twin benefits of rewarding a good auror while allowing him to surround himself once more with people he can trust to watch his back. Not that Percival is paranoid now, not exactly. Filled with disgust for MACUSA’s ineptitude and driven by a fury that’s been burning him up for the past year maybe; paranoia  though, that’s a brittle weakness he cannot allow himself.

Tina knows what he is by dint of being part of his most closely associated team, although of course she’s never seen him like this. He suffers a brief twinge of fear that maybe she _won’t_ immediately make the connection, but then pushes it down. No, Tina’s a good auror. Tina’s an _excellent_ auror and she’ll know immediately what’s happened. Of course she will.

“And I suppose you’ll be able to meet Queenie’s _beau_ too,” Newt continues, and the way he says the word makes Percival look at him in curiosity. “You know, I really don’t know how that’s going to turn out, Nox. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m very happy for them, but-, I just…”

Percival watches as Newt sighs and shakes his head, obviously having tried for humour and failed completely. He wonders if the man had entertained a thing for Queenie in the past, which Percival wouldn’t hold against him - enough people have fallen in love with Queenie Goldstein that it’s almost expected. It sounds like he doesn’t approve of this new man though, from the tone of his voice. He seems deeply reluctant to even speak his name, and Percival takes from this that the man is perhaps not deemed of sufficient quality, either socially or otherwise. There’s certainly a strange sadness to Newt’s words that speaks of some opportunity lost somehow.

“I suppose you don’t have to worry about such things, do you?” Newt asks him, stoppering a bottle and giving it a thorough shake. “Uhm, I imagine it’s all the same to you.”

_Somewhat,_ Percival thinks in reply, rolling on to his belly to watch the final potion preparations. It always amuses him to watch people attempt this bit. The particular brew Newt’s concocting needs to be thoroughly mixed up, but has a tendency to explode all over the shaker if agitated for too long. Percival considers himself to be at a sufficient distance to both be outside the blast radius and capable of enjoying the show, besides which he can always make use of the bathing pool straight after.

“Well, I’ll tell you one thing, Nox. Love’s not easy,” Newt continues. He shakes his head, eyes distant, and then flips the stopper off the bottle with the deftness of a practiced potions master, and pours the liquid out into a waiting bowl. There’s a disappointing lack of detonation, and Percival sniffs regretfully and moves on to examining the state of the wounds on his paws. They’re healing excellently already, but he must remind Newt to put more ointment on them before he retires tonight. “At least Tina has forgiven me.”

Percival looks up. Forgiven? Newt catches his eye as he starts sifting a fine powder into his mixture, stirring it slowly. “She’s a good woman, Tina. I wish-...you know, if things were different, if, if _I_ were different, we could have made something of it, you know? I think-. I just, I _wanted_ to, you understand? And Merlin but the parents would have been overjoyed, they’ve been on at me for years to settle down. And I tried, Nox. I tried for their sake, and for mine, but in the end I just couldn’t do that to her, it wouldn’t have been fair. I’m not-...I’m just not that way inclined. Don’t get me wrong, Tina’s a remarkable person, I really do like her, Nox. But I like her as a friend, as a _best_ friend, and there’s no amount of wishful thinking’s going to change that. I’m not going to lead her astray because I’m too much of a coward to admit who I am to her.”

Percival settles himself more comfortably, head raised attentively. _Go on,_ he thinks. Newt does.

“Mother’s _still_ asking about it, you know. It’s been six months and she won’t let it drop. What am I supposed to do? I told her it didn’t work out, I can’t exactly tell her why. Well, I mean I could but no-. No, I really can’t deal with her and Father’s disappointment all over again. They already think I’m a wastrel, telling them the rest would send them to an early grave I’m sure. Anyway. Theseus knows, although he’s made it quite clear he despairs of me. Well, good for him, he’s already gotten what _he_ wants.”

If Percival’s jaguar form had eyebrows they’d be raised all the way up. As it is, he has _so many_ questions.

“No,” Newt continues more softly. “I suppose that’s not fair. Theseus won’t say anything because he’s not a bastard, all evidence to the contrary. He wouldn’t do that to me. Not with Mother and Father anyway. No...Thes’ won’t out me, he wouldn’t.”

_Ahhh,_ Percival thinks, something about Newt’s phrasing making understanding click into place. _I see. You’re a homosexual. Interesting._ He wonders, with no small amount of irritation, why the family would have a problem with that. Theseus has always struck him as having a little bit of that British stiff upper lip going on, but not so much that he can’t relax and enjoy life. Besides which, if he does have a secret problem with his brother’s inclinations then he’s going to be shocked to find that his counterpart in MACUSA shares exactly the same proclivities. Suck on _that_ , Theseus, old chap, he thinks grimly.

The whole thing is an unexpectedly interesting revelation truth be told. So much of this hadn’t been in the files, though he supposes he can’t fault Tina for not relaying such information - far too close to her heart after all. Percival thinks back to the photos he’s seen of Newt. Mousy, frightened, a little strange-looking. He wonders how much of it had been an entirely understandable response to an honestly terrifying situation, rather than a typical set of mannerisms. And yet...several of his aurors had repeatedly mentioned the man’s eccentricity when he’d grilled them on his return to work. Mind you, considering how poorly they’d done at observation elsewhere he’s moved to disregard their assessments entirely, no- _No_. he’s allowing his anger to get the better of him again.

Percival digs his talons into the soft earth beneath his paws until the anger subsides and his heartbeat returns to something approximating normal. He’s getting better at that as time goes on. The mind healer’s recommended visualisations have helped a great deal. As has this unexpected sojourn in Newton Scamander’s case, if he’s to be honest, although the circumstances could have been somewhat improved by being here in his human form - and by choice.

“All right, Nox?”

Newt is watching him. Percival looks up and reads the beginnings of concern on the man’s face, and thinks he’s not seen a single trace of the fearful evasiveness with which he’d been attributed in the reports. Instead he sees the man about whom Tina can do nothing but sing praises. He’d thought her simply taken with him, maybe a little romantically after all their escapades, and perhaps he’d been right, but then again, perhaps he’d been too quick to judge. From what he’s seen so far the man is sound of judgement, sound of character, and somewhere on the knife-edge between courage and foolhardiness. He’s still not entirely sure which it is.

“Fine,” he says back, the words coming out as a sharp huff. “Just fine.”

Newt smiles, and begins to pipette his mixture into a series of small potion bottles. Percival sighs, tail flicking slightly. Some people just don’t photograph well he supposes, and returns to licking his paws in thoughtful silence.

  


*

 

  
The butcher has a young woman, his daughter presumably, serving behind the counter, and she gestures behind her with one hand at the row of hanging rabbits.

“Preference?” she asks, eyebrow raised.

“Uhm, biggest one please,” Newt replies, glancing up briefly, then ducking his head. “He eats a lot.”

She doesn’t respond and he thinks: _Stop.Talking_ at himself. He waits while she bags the rabbit for him, then hands over some money and makes his way back out onto the street. The rabbit hadn’t been on his original list of purchases, but as with every other trip to the stores he makes he ends up buying more for his beasts than he does for himself. He’d needed cheese, having accidentally eaten the last of it before he could transfigure more, but he knows Nox will be delighted with a nice fresh rabbit for tea.

Newt makes his way down the street, enjoying the weak warmth of a late afternoon sun. It’s their last stopover before the train gets to New York tomorrow night, and he’s glad of it. They’re staying in another cheap hotel, the privacy a room affords making it much easier for him to go down and care for his beasts undisturbed. The afternoon is rapidly becoming chilly as the sun sets, and Newt pushes on back towards the hotel. It’s a pity he can’t bring Nox up here to get a bit of a look around, but wandering the streets of town with a jaguar in tow would raise far too many eyebrows, and even the possibility of notice-me-nots carries far too much risk in this incredibly strict country.

Over the last few days Newt has found himself becoming surprisingly fond of his new beast. Nox is an easy companion: quick to obey, fiercely intelligent, and incredibly well socialised. His old master must have spent years training him up to this standard. At the thought of the man Newt’s spirits dip just a little. It would be shocking to wish the man untraceable for whatever reason, but he has to admit he’s quickly grown warm to the concept of a permanent familiar. So many of his beasts come into his care and are moved on again as fast as is reasonably possible - they belong in the wild after all, not penned up for his amusement - and sometimes he misses having a long term companion of his own.

He thinks back to the last town where, of his own accord, Nox had corralled the escaped Bowtruckles, and then later sat guard through the night at Newt’s bedside. He’d not liked that town, and had felt distinctly uneasy the entire time they were there, particularly as he’d been followed along the street by a group of three men on his way back to that hotel. Perhaps they’d intended no harm, but experience has taught Newt cynicism. Well, they’d have gotten a real shock if they’d somehow managed to get through his locking charms, only to be met by a jaguar and the sharpest of Newt’s defensive spells.

Newt gets back to the hotel in good time, purchases slung over his shoulder, and is met almost at the foot of the ladder by Nox. The jaguar comes sauntering over from somewhere within Frank’s old enclosure to investigate Newt’s return, sticking his nose in the bag Newt sets down, and then looking up at the trapdoor and drawing in a deep breath to scent the air. Newt knows full well that the beast is curious is about the outside world, but so far he’s made no attempts to escape that Newt has noticed. In fact he’s done nothing but stop other beasts from trying it.

Strangely warmed by the personal welcome, Newt unpacks his items, and then calls for Nox to follow him on his feeding rounds. They visit each enclosure in turn, and even go to the caves where they haven’t had another incident with Sydney since the last, although Nox clearly hasn’t forgiven the giant Runespoor and refuses to turn his back on him even for a moment. Over the last few days Newt has been watching Nox closely, and not just Nox, his beasts too. They’ve all reacted remarkably, almost uncannily well to the jaguar’s presence, and Newt is honestly surprised by it. He’s had incidents in the past with magical beasts taking issue with non-magical ones, enough that he’d already had plans in place for some form of isolation habitat, but to discover his concerns are unfounded is both a relief and a curiosity. He wonders what it is about Nox that sets him apart. Perhaps it’s simply his long exposure to magic as a familiar that the others are able to read on him.

After everyone else is fed, Newt takes a seat on the shed steps, his dinner in one hand, the other holding out the rabbit. At the sight of food Nox attends him immediately, and takes the rabbit gently from his hand, settling down at the foot of the steps to begin crunching it up. Newt watches him fondly, stroking his toe down the beast’s flank.

“You know,” he says. “If you can’t find another home I wouldn’t mind having a familiar again. I mean, you’d have to promise not to eat anyone, but we could make it work. If you wanted.”

Nox looks up from his meal, and tilts his head in a manner that Newt could swear seems amused. He gives Newt a huff that’s somewhere close to what Newt imagines a jaguar’s laugh might be, and then returns to his rabbit.

“All right then,” Newt says, smiling at himself. “We’ll see, won’t we?”

They each return to their respective meals, and later Newt lets the familiar sleep up in the hotel room with him, for safety perhaps, but, if he’s entirely honest, mostly just for the company.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A note on attitudes: From what I’ve read, the 20s were a _relatively_ good time for the LGBT community in New York, and it turned bad in the 30s, so Percival’s laid-back attitude to Newt’s being gay shouldn’t be all that odd. Even so, I think the Magical world has always held to far better standards than the rest of society, so I envisage Newt’s being gay as not so much a problem for his family in terms of him preferring men, as it’s a fear of another thing for wider (Muggle) society to persecute him for - after all, gay sex between men was only decriminalised in the UK in 1967. 
> 
> Also, I couldn’t find a positive word for gay that was both time-period appropriate and didn't seem to be suspiciously pejorative as well, so I went with the more formal “homosexual” instead. On the other hand I think that’s actually the language Percival might have used, even though it feels very clinical I think. If anyone else has found a better word in their research, let me know.
> 
> Next chapter is not called “New York, New York!” but it could have been.


	5. Secrets All Round

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Jacob is surprisingly sanguine about apex predators in the home, and Newt gets a letter and drowns his sorrows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this chapter’s hours of research for one throwaway line was exactly what the floor-plan of the Goldstein sisters’ apartment really was. I’d not picked up on the fact they’d given the guys their own beds in the film, but I think that’s actually what happened if you look at the decor between shots. I’m not sure where the sisters then slept - the lounge I guess. Looks like they don’t have their own bathroom either. Clearly being an auror, even before being busted down to Wand Permits, didn’t pay all that well.

 

Newt arrives back in New York some time close to midnight on a bitterly cold Wednesday night. Despite the hour, Tina is there to greet him, and she gives him only the mildest of dressing-downs for being almost two weeks late. “I did say, Tina, that I might not be entirely on schedule,” he defends himself. She shakes her head, and takes his arm, leading him away with a resigned, “I know, Newt. I know.”

The sisters’ apartment is all warmth and comfort, and Queenie comes out from the kitchen area to greet him, bringing with her the wafting scent of home cooking. Newt lets her embrace him, still rendered shy by her attention even now, but not enough that he doesn’t ask after food. As late as it is, he’d known full well there’d be far more excellent fare on offer once he made it back than anything he could have scraped together down in his case. Queenie’s cooking is worth going a little hungry for. 

They share a simple, delicious meal, during which Newt tells them about his success with the Jackalopes. He feels almost unwilling to mention Nox, as though admitting to his presence will send Tina immediately out on a quest that will ultimately result in him being taken away. It’s a silly thought, and probably somewhat beneath him, but a persistent underlying distrust of Government protocols - bolstered by his own experience on both sides of the fence - keeps him quiet until the meal’s almost over. 

“I uhm, I’m sorry I was late back. It’s just, I found a beast. Wounded, and I had to stop and help him recover,” he says mildly.

At the word ‘beast’ Tina’s eyes flick to him with sudden renewed interest, and Newt swallows. “Oh?” she asks lightly, but he can hear the wariness in her voice despite her effort to mask it.

“Not a dangerous one, Tina,” he replies a little crossly, “But one in need of help. I had to spend some time healing him up. He’d been wounded, you see.”

“I see,” she replies. “What kind of beast?”

“A jaguar,” Newt says simply, triumphant in the knowledge that a non-magical beast is well outside the bounds of MACUSA’s scrutiny.

“Oh,” she says, eyebrows raised. “Well. I hope you got him released okay.”

Newt looks uncertain, already gripped by a sense of impending condemnation, although he can’t quite work out why that should be the case. “Well...he’s still down in my case actually-”

“Oh Newt!” Tina says, laying down her spoon sharply. “You can’t just bring a jaguar into central New York! There’s strict restrictions on moving exotic and dangerous animals like that!”

“There are?” Newt blinks. “Huh, well, actually, he’s not dangerous really, he’s very well socialised-”

“ _ Newt!” _

“Hey, Teenie, it’s okay, don’t get worked up,” Queenie interrupts, head tilted in Newt’s direction. “He’s not any ordinary jaguar, is he honey?”

Grateful for the rescue, Newt nods. “Oh no, actually, he’s a familiar.”

Tina blinks, and shakes her head. “How do you know?”

“Well…” Newt draws in a deep breath, and begins to explain the last two weeks.

  
  


*

  
  


“You said he had a wallet on him?” Tina asks as she steps carefully down the ladder into the case.

Newt ducks his head to look out the door, and can already see Nox cantering across the yard towards them. He seems excited by the presence of a visitor, and Newt puts himself between the ladder and the incoming beast, just as a precaution.

“Hello, Nox,” he says. “Slow down there, this is Tina- hey, hey! Get back! Nox!”

Tina has already backed up several steps into the small workroom as the enormous black jaguar enters at speed, and moves to push past Newt to get at her. He’s making a deep growling noise that sounds thoroughly aggressive to Tina’s ears, and she already has her wand out ready to fend him off. To Newt the noise, as deep and guttural as it is, is simply jaguar chatter, and the body language speaks only of excitement and interest, not aggression. Still, he’s being very rude.

“Oi!” he says, giving the beast a sharp tap on the nose with the back of his fingers to get his attention. “That is quite enough. You’re being rude! Behave!”

Nox draws up short, entirely unfazed by the smack, but clearly not understanding what he’s done wrong. He looks from Newt to Tina, and then gives a sharp, excited greeting cry and stares at her. Tina, pressed back almost flat against the far wall, keeps her wand up, and Newt catches sight of it as he glances back. “No, it’s all right, you don’t need to worry, he’s not going to attack you, he’s just excited. I’m sorry, Tina, I don’t know why he’s being like this, he did it to me too when he first woke up. I’d forgotten actually. I think, I think he just likes humans.”

Nox gives a moaning sort of growl, but he doesn’t try to approach any closer, and Tina nervously straightens up. In the restricted space of Newt’s shed, the jaguar is very large. She can smell the feline scent of him, a little bit musky, and wrinkles her nose just a little at the meaty smell on his breath. Clearly he’s just finished eating something. Still, for all her reaction she trusts Newt’s judgement, and lowers her wand. “He’s big,” she says, still too wary for anything more complex.

“Yes, he is rather,” Newt agrees. “Brazilian, I think. They’re the largest if memory serves.”

“And he’s definitely friendly?”

“Absolutely! You can pet him if you like,” Newt crouches down next to Nox and puts an arm across his chest and up round his neck, ostensibly as a friendly action, but primarily to encourage him not to barge their guest. Nox blinks at him, and then at Tina, and then goes completely silent. Tina notes this sudden shift in his attitude, and shakes her head. “I’m good, thanks. I’ll just let him be. He’s very impressive, Newt. Very...big.” 

Newt nods, understanding her reluctance but perhaps just a bit disappointed, and gives Nox a pat on the flank. “Mm, biggest one I’ve seen actually. I do wonder if he was changed just a bit by his old master, if you know what I mean. The eyes too. Uhm, yes.”

The jaguar is still watching her intently, and Tina shifts slightly to keep him fully in her line of sight. He huffs at her, the sound guttural and tripping over a growl at the end. The weight of his attention is discomforting in the way that only the gaze of such a large predator can be, and she clears her throat uneasily. Were he to pounce right at this moment she’d have to be very fast to get her wand up in time. She can do it, but she doesn’t particularly want to have to. “So. The wallet, Newt?”

“Oh! Oh right, yes,” Newt glances at her, hesitates, and then says, “I’ll uhm, I’ll just put him outside and dig it out. Come on, Nox.”

It takes Newt a couple of attempts to get the jaguar’s attention, but eventually, through a combination of shoving and cajoling, he manages to back Nox out of the shed, and close the door on him. He can hear the beast hanging around on the steps outside, and frowns through the little window at him.  _ Stop it,  _ he mouths through the glass, back to Tina so she can’t see him do it. He’s not sure what’s eating the beast, but from the grumpy cast to his turned back ears and agitated pacing, he’s not a happy creature.

“I’m not sure he likes me,” Tina says doubtfully.

“Nonsense!” Newt exclaims, but he’s not sure what’s going on either. “Right then, uhm, yes. Wallet. It’s on my desk somewhere. I’ll find it.”

It takes him a few minutes of digging around before he pulls out the package and hands it over. Tina opens the passport and looks down at it. “Alastair Sinclair,” she says, shaking her head slowly. “Well, it doesn’t ring a bell. Animal permits were never really my jurisdiction though.  I’ll run him through the system and see if anything comes up.”

“Thanks, Tina, I’d be very grateful. If he is still around out there then we should try and get his familiar back to him.”

She squints at him doubtfully. “And he was nowhere to be found when the jaguar turned up?”   
  
Newt shrugs, “Well, it’s a big forest, Tina. I did ask Nox where he was, and you’d expect a familiar to track back to their master immediately - it’s what they’re supposed to do, you know that. But he didn’t. And I did scout around as far as possible while he was recovering, I didn’t just sit there!”

“All right, Newt,” Tina says soothingly. “I’m not accusing you, just being thorough. These questions are going to come up if there’s any kind of inquiry.”   


“Inquiry?!” Newt exclaims, alarmed. 

She shakes her head, “You rescued him, but there might be some details need going over. Look, Newt, I’ll take care of it. Don’t worry about it, it...it won’t be like last time.” Seeing Newt’s unconvinced expression, she smiles. “And besides, Mr Graves is still out of town, so you won’t even have to risk running into him.”

“That’s a relief,” Newt says, returning her smile weakly. “I, well, I have to admit I was worried he’d be back by now. And well, well you know.”

Tina nods. She’s well aware of Newt’s reluctance to meet the Director, and no matter what she says to reassure him that the real Percival Graves is a good man, she’s not sure he’s entirely convinced. On one level she actually finds it somewhat offensive that Newt reacts so badly to the very thought of running into him again - after all, Director Graves is a man of unquestionably good character, nothing at all like the fiend Grindelwald. To avoid him simply because of what Grindelwald did, well - and here she has to stop and remind herself that she too still suffers from the trauma of that time. She still has bad dreams about the rising black and the cold, cold eyes of the man they’d all thought they knew. To condemn Newt’s reluctance is probably unfair, but still.

“I know, Newt,” she says. “But it’s fine, really. He’s not in town and there’s no reason I can’t take care of this for you. We’ll just, it’ll be fine. Really.”

Newt gives her a watery smile, and Tina nods in reassurance. “Get some sleep, we can talk more tomorrow.”

She takes the wallet with her when she climbs back up to her apartment. Newt follows, and, in something of a tongue-in-cheek tradition, she brings him a mug of hot cocoa before finally saying goodnight.

  
  


*

  
  


She didn’t recognise him. She didn’t damned well recognise him!

Percival Graves stands at the foot of the shed’s steps and feels like he’s floating away on a rising swell of panic.  _ This is not the same _ , he tells himself.  _ It’s an entirely different situation, far removed from what’s gone before. _

She knows though. She’d been told, just as every auror that joins the Major Crimes unit is informed, as part of their acceptance into the team on the understanding that the knowledge might one day be pertinent to their situation. Percival Graves is an animagus, and his animal form is a black jaguar.  _ How many black jaguars do you run into out there, Tina? _

But of course, Tina is very new to Major Crimes. What’s it been? Four months? Six months? When was she told? Did they stress to her the importance of the knowledge, or did she dismiss it as teasing? No, Tina’s too serious for that. Alvarez, her mentor, would never have made a joke out of it, but would she have done more than mention it once? And of course, what are the chances? Tina’s never seen him in this form, she has no reason to suspect -  _ but how many black jaguars do you expect to meet in your life? _ he howls mentally.

Pathetically, the one thing to have penetrated the swirl of his panic had been the relief in Newt’s voice when he’d discovered Percival apparently still out of town. That had hurt. He doesn’t even know what to make of his reaction to it, surprised by the depth of it even, strong enough that he can nonetheless use it to snap himself out of the growing threat of hysteria.

_ Get a fucking grip, _ he snarls to himself. 

So, Tina’s too inexperienced to recognise him. That’s fine, it’s almost predictable. He should have expected this, he thinks grimly - it’s his own fault for not thinking the situation through properly. She’s too new to make the connection. His own strict secrecy and reluctance to appear in his animal form before his people has once more been his undoing. It’s something that he’s going to have to sit down and have a serious think about once he gets out of this mess and back to the office. Which he’s going to because the situation is not beyond salvage; Tina’s taken his alias’ identity documents and is going to run them through the system. Eventually that’ll trigger the flag on them and alert the right people and then- fucking Morgana, he’s going to look like a complete fool but at least he’ll be out of here. 

Newt doesn’t come back out. Percival waits around the bottom of the stairs, pacing the courtyard until he hears their footsteps creak on the ladder back up to wherever it is they’re staying, and then the soft thud-click of the lid closing. He waits, expecting Newt to return, but of course he doesn’t. Why would he? The beasts are all fed, their environments tended, and it’s probably somewhere close to the middle of the night. He doesn’t exactly need to come back and tuck his jaguar in, does he?

Furious despite himself, Percival stalks away across the yard, veering off from Frank’s enclosure and towards the circuit of paths open to him. He’s in no mood to sleep right now, and some activity will help him burn off his bad temper. He passes the Niffler’s den and the Jarvey’s mound as he goes. The light from within the Niffler’s lair is a muted golden glow, and the creature is nowhere to be seen. The Jarvey is out though; perched on the very top of its home it glares down at him and snarls at him to do something deeply offensive with himself, or it’ll come on down and do something equally rude with his tail.

“Fuck off, weasel,” he snarls at it. “Or  _ I’ll _ come up there and eat you.”

It spits something in return, but by that time Percival is already past and disappearing off into the depths of the case, his tail swishing angrily behind him.

  
  


*

 

It takes Percival all of ten hours to be overcome by frustration. 

Newt arrives down in time for morning feeding, yawning and bleary-eyed, and Percival follows close on his heels as they go on the rounds, intent on being there the moment some news arrives. But it doesn’t. Newt takes care of the breakfast routine, chattering at Percival about being back in New York, and for once Percival doesn’t listen. He pads along in grim silence, ducking away from Newt’s outstretched hand to sit out of reach and lick his paws. Newt notices his newly aloof manner, but only attempts reconciliation the once. Percival ignores his offer of a fresh chick, too furious with everything to play along today, and eventually Newt lays the treat out on the steps to Frank’s enclosure and retreats upstairs to the wider world. 

“I’m off shopping,” he says. “It’s Queenie’s birthday in a few days and I want to find something for her.”

Percival, frustrated by the lack of news, leaps up on to his perch and settles down to watch the shed for any indication of movement. He’s working out for the hundredth time how long it will likely take for his ID to trigger a system flag, what specific checks Tina will need to do before she hits one, when it suddenly occurs to him. Queenie. He raises his head sharply, staring off into the distance as a plan begins to form.  _ Queenie! _

They’re more than likely staying with the Goldsteins, since Newt is such good friends with them. And if the youngest Goldstein is here, right above him, then she is the perfect antidote to this inability to communicate! Queenie will simply pluck the thoughts from his mind! 

He stands up excitedly, tail lashing, and wonders how he’s going to go about doing this. 

  
  


*

  
  


The morning is half over by the time Percival settles on his plan. Midday finds him in the shed, up on the counter, front legs stretched up to the shelves that line the walls, a careful paw hooking out a specific container. It clatters to the worktop with a ring of metal on wood, and he has to rescue it from falling with a quick snatch of one hind paw. It’ll do no good if its contents end up scattered all over for anyone to take.

Already this morning he’s wasted far too long on climbing the ladder to the outside world and poking his head around the base of the trapdoor. With his senses dulled and his magic unresponsive, he cannot even see the lines of power that make up Newt’s locking charm, let alone work any mischief to undo them. And so he’s settled on this plan instead, though success is most certainly not a given.

Poking the tin with his nose he wraps his teeth around it experimentally. The cap is a simple push-top, although it’s stiff enough in its hold to frustrate most creatures without either strength or opposable thumbs. Not so his jaguar’s teeth however, and, ignoring the bitter tang of metal against his teeth, he begins to loosen the cap some, enough to prove he can open it at the appointed time. 

He’s put some thought into how he’s going to go about getting the lid of the case open. Newt is extremely careful about both entering and exiting the case, and there’s no real chance he can get past the man while he’s on the ladder, and even were he to be successful a quick entrapment spell would soon put paid to any further freedoms he might temporarily gain. No, Percival needs a lockpick. 

There’s the tiniest hint of movement at the door to the shed and Percival glances up, teeth still closed around the tin.  _ There you are, _ he thinks grimly. The Niffler peers around the edge of the door frame, its bright little eyes affixed on the jaguar. Percival knows the thing must have been watching him from the moment he went up the ladder - it’s always on the lookout for opportunity and someone scratching around the point of exit is bound to excite its interest. For now though, he ignores it, and taking a more firm grip on the tin, jumps down and makes his way outside. 

As expected, the Niffler follows.

This is the part of his plan that Percival’s not sure of. He has the requirement: getting out of the case. He has the reward: the contents of the tin. And he has the intended tool. Unfortunately that tool doesn’t like him very much. Nifflers though, he’d read up on them after he’d returned to work and seen Newt’s come up in the reports. Previously he’d only really read about them in books at school. Small, troublesome, and capable of displaying dangerous levels of intelligence in the pursuit of their goals, he just hopes the beast is clever enough to work out what he needs from it.

Coming to a halt around the side of the shed, he drops the tin on the ground and reaches down to begin prying the lid off, lifting one edge with his teeth just enough that the scent of candied cherries drifts out. Then he stares around the corner of the hut in the direction of the Wiggentree, searching intently for any movement that will betray the presence of a Bowtruckle. After a second he feels the Niffler’s presence by his foot, the tiny beast fearless next to him despite his far greater size and predatory nature. It dips its head to look inside the tin, then follows Percival’s gaze towards the Wiggentree. After a moment it makes an unconvinced noise in its throat, and Percival peers down at it intently.  

“They won’t come over for me,” he tells the Niffler. “But they’d listen to you.”

Would they? Percival really doesn’t know. What he’s certain of is that reward or not, no matter how wild the things go for candied cherries whenever he’s seen Newt handing them out, after their disastrous first encounter none of them are going to listen to him about anything, and nor are they going to help him escape either. He’d spent a good hour this morning mentally going back and forth on this. If they won’t help him willingly can they be coerced into doing so? Threatening them is almost certain to backfire, and besides, it feels rather cruel, even if he has no real intention of harming them - he’s not a bully after all. He could flex his claws in the direction of their precious scratching post of a tree, but that too feels caddish and beneath him. Bribery seems like the best option, but how does one bribe a living twig? 

And so he’d settled on the candied cherries option, and with a vague understanding that the Niffler would probably turn up the moment he did anything of interest near the ceiling trap door, he’d put events into motion. 

The Niffler cocks its head at him, and Percival’s sure it doesn’t understand a word of what he’s asking of it. As far as the little beast is concerned this could all be some kind of strange peace offering after the furore of a few days back. “Come on, little guy. You get one of them to open that door, and I’ll make sure you get something nice for your hoard once all this blows over. You’ll be working with the authorities for once, won’t that be a hoot?” 

It stares at him. Percival sighs. Maybe he’ll just grab a Bowtruckle and threaten it into getting the damned trap door open after all. But then the Niffler scurries away, so sharply it almost makes Percival jump, and he watches as it heads over to the Wiggentree. The tiny beast is up the tree and along a branch so fast he can barely follow the movement with his eyes, and then it’s shooting back across the yard towards the shed at breakneck speed, its gait erratic and wavering as it careens back around the corner. It comes to a halt at the base of the shed, and there’s a furious skittering and tiny screeching as it engages in a scuffle with its latest prize.

“Did you just steal a Bowtruckle?” Percival asks it, both aghast and impressed at once.  _ Kidnap _ , a part of him corrects.  _ Kidnap a Bowtruckle. _

Neither the Niffler nor the now extremely angry Bowtruckle it’s brought back give him a reply, and there’s a flurry of movement so fast he can barely see it, before the fight is taken up the stairs and inside the shed. Percival can hear them hissing and squeaking at one another inside, and he peers around the corner of the building, somewhat guiltily, to see if any of the other Bowtruckles have stirred. Apparently not, for there’s no movement at all along the branches of the Wiggentree. Picking the tin up in his jaws he cautiously slinks up the stairs after them and stands in the doorway looking in.

The Niffler has somehow managed to manhandle the Bowtruckle up the ladder to the top steps and is now engaged in a standoff with the creature. The Bowtruckle perches on the highest rung of the ladder, radiating fury, its arms folded defiantly. For its part the Niffler looks, if anything, amused, and without a scratch on it, damn the beast, Percival adds mentally. As for the Bowtruckle, Percival can’t tell which one it is, though he thinks it might be one of the ringleaders from his last encounter with them. 

He drops the tin of candies to the ground with a gentle clatter, and the Bowtruckle looks over. It gives an alarmed shriek, and then starts pointing furiously at the Niffler. In his long experience as an auror, Percival’s come across this behaviour often enough.  _ Wasn’t me, guv’nor! It was all him!  _ And for once it’s true.

He stares up at the pair of them, letting the Bowtruckle squeak itself out, and then, giving the beast enough time to realise its predicament, he reaches down to pick up the tin, and begins to pad slowly towards the foot of the ladder. The Bowtruckle has gone silent, wary of Newt’s feline enforcer, and Percival wonders to himself how it is he always seems to end up in the unenviable position of being a terror to all those around him. Not that it doesn’t sometimes have its uses, he admits as he sets his feet on the ladder, and, digging in his claws, begins to climb.

The Bowtruckle watches him ascend in silence, its tiny little eyes full of wariness. The Niffler is blocking its retreat, and for a second Percival is overcome by the feeling that this whole thing looks more like a shakedown than a plea for help. He stops just two rungs down from the beast, and very carefully sets the tin down on the rung below. A sweet scent drifts from the partially open lid, and the Bowtruckle’s eyes flick from Percival to the tin. 

The Niffler makes them both jump when it shoots suddenly up past the Bowtruckle to the underside of the case’s lid, and starts scratching around at the edges. It makes a show of pushing against the exit, then stares meaningfully at the Bowtruckle. The Bowtruckle - Poppy? Marlow? Tita? Percival has no idea - looks doubtfully from the case’s most mischievous inhabitant and back to its newest and most strict. Percival gives the tin a nudge in its direction. 

Greed wins out. The Bowtruckle’s clever little eyes take in the nearly full tin of treats as it begins to calculate the reward of further mischief.  _ Loyalty be damned, eh? _ Percival thinks, watching as the Bowtruckle jabs the Niffler aside with the sharp points of its claws and sets to work picking at the air around the edge of the trapdoor. He’s never actually seen one of these beasts at work before, but he knows enough from his own understanding of magic to make sense of what it’s doing. The fact he currently can’t see the spellthreads it’s picking apart is something he pushes to the back of his mind; a swift resolution to that issue is the entire reason for all this after all.

After a moment it occurs to him that he ought to get a paw on the Niffler before it has a chance to take advantage of their temporary alliance and use it to escape into the wider world. He’s not sure his already thoroughly battered reputation will survive it should he be found to be the cause of a Niffler’s inner city rampage: the Ghost would have a field day with it. He’s lifting a slow paw up into position just as the case’s latches click, and the lid flicks open, faster than he’d anticipated.

The Niffler is off like a rocket. It’s gone from beneath his hovering paw in an instant, up past the startled Bowtruckle, and heading in the direction of freedom before either of them can react. Such is its speed that when it hits the invisible ward covering the entrance to the case it ricochets back down with enough force that Percival hears one of the rungs creak on impact when it collides with it. Both he and the Bowtruckle duck aside, and the Niffler hits the floor below with an outraged squeak.

Percival and the Bowtruckle peer down at it, then back up at the case opening. 

“Huh,” Percival says. “Niffler ward?”

The Bowtruckle makes a little noise of agreement, and Percival reaches out cautiously with one paw, testing the apparently empty space. He encounters no resistance, at least none that he can perceive, his paw passing through the opening unobstructed. He looks at the Bowtruckle who looks back at him.

“Guess I don’t have to tell you not to follow me,” he says. It chirrs softly. “Uh huh, little guy. Take your candies and get gone.”

The Bowtruckle doesn’t need to be told twice. Wrapping its arms around the tin it hops down the rungs one by one, sticking its tongue out at the Niffler sat huffing and furious at the base of the ladder as it passes. Satisfied it’s on its way, Percival pulls himself up the remaining rungs and ventures cautiously out of the case.

  
  


* 

  
  


Percival emerges into a small bedroom and looks cautiously around. There’s twin beds, one along each wall, and the accompanying shelves are filled with books and women’s accoutrements. Newt’s case has been set down carefully next to a pair of dark wood doors, slightly ajar, partitioning off the room from the rest of the living space. He lifts his head to scent the air. The room smells of the Goldstein sisters, their makeup and the incense they burn, but woven between that is a thread of Newt’s scent, and the higher, sweeter notes of women’s perfume. It’s not to his tastes in this form, but he recognises it from days at the office as being Queenie’s favoured scent.

_ Perfect, _ he thinks. 

Except - he can hear voices from the room beyond, and one of them is not a voice he recognises. Percival pads softly along the doors to the gap, and listens intently. He can hear Queenie, but there’s a man with her too, and it’s not Newt. The scent of flour and cologne is on the air, and he twitches his nose at the mixture: someone has been baking.

The two of them are talking about something Queenie has seen in one of the shops, a hat Percival thinks, and he can hear from the way the man is saying very little that although Queenie is talking about sewing an identical one for herself, he fully intends to buy it for her as a gift. “Oh, stop that, sweetie,” Queenie says. “I like to sew! Though it’s very sweet of you.”

_ You need to learn some occlumency, friend,  _ Percival thinks, and slinks carefully round the door and out into the living space. The two of them are sat at the other end of the room, and he can hear the low crackle of a fire, and smell the itch of smoke in the air. He makes his way quietly past a rickety-looking dining table and towards the sound of voices, wondering what the best way to go about this will be. 

Percival pauses just out of their line of sight to take in the scene. Queenie, and what must be her beau, are sitting either side of the fire in comfy-looking little armchairs, warming themselves by its cheerful flicker. Despite being not much past midday, there’s a distinct chill on the air, the bite of the season still apparent even in the heart of the city. He looks curiously at this new man friend of hers, the one who has yet to win Newt’s approval, and wonders what to make of him. He smells of honey and flour, and speaks with a Brooklyn drawl which implies he’s local, but Percival doesn’t recognise him. Not that he expects to really. There aren’t  _ that _ many magical folk in New York, but there has been a significant swell in numbers the last few decades. It’s not that unlikely for them not to have met, and besides, his jaguar brain is useless with human faces.

Whoever the man is, there’s a more pressing concern right now. It’s a shame he’s here, because Percival could both do without the audience, but also the unknown reaction his presence will provoke. He hesitates, aware all at once of his size and form, and how intimidating he might be were he to appear unexpectedly in one’s living room. Still, there’s really no helping it.

He moves himself into Queenie’s line of sight, and says, very politely, “Miss Goldstein.”

Queenie gasps, going rigid in her chair, hands grasping the armrests as her eyes alight on him. 

“What is it?” her companion asks in concern, “Queenie, honey-, oh. Ooooh! Is that one of Newt’s creatures?”

Percival glances at the man, now turned round in his armchair, leaning over the side to look at him. “He’s a big fella.”

“Indeed - look, I apologise for interrupting in this manner, but, ah, Queenie?” Percival continues, then hesitates. Queenie has by now fumbled her wand into her hand and is beginning to point it in his direction with the sort of grip that clearly indicates the coming spell is not going to be entirely friendly.

Percival takes a step back. This is simply not happening. “Miss Goldstein, please. This is unnecessary, I’m not going to- Queenie!”

“You are not supposed to be out here! You bad kitty!”

He has no idea what she’s intending to cast at him, and he really doesn’t want to find out. Luckily for Percival his hurried attempt to back up is having the desired effect of dampening her intention to cast in his direction, but still Queenie has risen to her feet and is now advancing on him, wand out, with absolutely no indication that she understands him whatsoever.

_How_ _are you not able to read my thoughts?_ he thinks desperately. _This is absolutely ridiculous! Queenie, come on!_

“You will go back in that case, right now, mister, and believe you me, Newt’s going to hear about this when he gets home!”

_ Marvellous, _ Percival thinks bitterly as he continues to retreat.  _ Just fucking marvellous. What in Morgana’s name is going on here?  _

“Go on, get!” Queenie makes a shooing motion with her wand, one that looks suspiciously like the start of a bludgeoning spell, and although Percival’s not entirely sure she can even cast those, his pride is not ready for him to be swept off his feet by the currently superior combat magic of an admin girl. Queenie’s quite lovely, but Percival Graves is Director of MACUSA, most powerful wizard in all of North America, and he simply cannot stand it. 

_ You’re cursed,  _ he thinks.  _ This has to be a curse. _

Furiously embarrassed, dismayed, and confused beyond measure, he turns tail and flees, back through the tiny little apartment and down into the case, hearing the lid snap closed and lock securely behind him.

  
  


*

 

There’s an owl scratching at the window when Tina and Newt get back from the restaurant that evening. Newt’s spent the day visiting contacts in the city and had met Tina after work for food, since Queenie already had a date with Jacob. Oh,  _ Jacob. _ The whole Jacob situation is carrying on fit to drive Newt mad. Despite Queenie’s courting of him, and the beautiful and clearly fantastical sugar animals he bakes, his memories of what transpired a year ago are still not fully returned. He doesn’t know that Tina’s an auror, or the extent to which magic exists; he thinks Queenie is some kind of fey wise woman, a little bit mad but entirely wonderful, and adores her for it, and as far as Newt knows Jacob thinks he’s part explorer part circus runaway.

“You told him I’m  _ what? _ ”

“A beast tamer! You know, honey, like at the circus! It’s perfect!”

It is  _ not _ perfect, and Newt is very unhappy about it all. Still, he can hardly complain, it’s not as though he agrees with the whole mass obliviation of Muggles rule, it’s just- the whole situation’s a mess, and the best they can hope for is for Jacob’s memories to straighten themselves out and for him to finally snap back to understanding one day. It’s hard, and not just on Newt and of course Queenie, but Tina too. She won’t discuss the matter, going about her life as though her sister hasn’t stepped well over the fine line of legality and into criminal activity. And what with her being an auror too. Newt feels for her.

The owl is flapping impatiently against the glass as Tina levers the window awkwardly open to let it in. Newt has already gone over to pull his case out from beneath the dresser where he’d left it wedged earlier. Queenie had dropped in to the Woolworth building before dinner to find Newt as he waited for Tina, and told him all about Nox’s brief outing earlier. Newt had been horrified, all manner of terrible scenarios playing through his head, but when he’d apparated back to the apartment and gone down into the case half-expecting to find an emergency had driven the familiar out in search of aid, he’d found nothing out of order. Nox had been sulking up on his perch, the inside of the case’s lid didn’t look damaged, and no-one was missing. It simply didn’t make sense! The only thing out of place was the tin of Bowtruckle treats the Niffler had clearly stolen, emptied and then polished up for his nest.  

Newt had given the latches on the case a double-check before he’d left, wedging the entire thing under a low dresser just to be certain. He must not have closed it properly. Lucky Jacob has retained his sense of ease around beasts, fantastic or otherwise, and hadn’t overreacted in any unfortunate way. Still, what damned mess. He’d made Queenie promise not to mention the whole incident to Tina, just in case.

“Huh, it’s for you, Newt.”

He looks up to find Tina offering a small letter to him, the owl perched carefully on her dish-cloth wrapped forearm. Probably from the publisher, he thinks, accepting the envelope and turning it over. A spike of shock goes through him, deep and unpleasant, as he recognises the hand-writing. It’s been a very, very long time since he’s seen it and from the presence of it alone he knows exactly what’s inside the envelope. Only half-aware of what he’s doing he digs out some coins for the owl and hands them to Tina to place in the little pouch on its leg. 

“You know, Tina. I think I’m actually rather tired.”

“Oh,” she says back over her shoulder, still fiddling with the leather ties. “Um, I thought we might have cocoa or, you know something, before bed. It’s still early? Newt?”   
  
“Uhm,” he says vaguely, then tears his eyes away from the envelope to glance up at her. “No, I’m- it’s been a long day. I think I’ll just, you know, the beasts. There’s things I should do. I think an early night is best.”

Confusion creases her face as Tina carries the owl to the window, then tosses it back outside. “I thought you’d already done the beasts before we met up. Is everything okay, Newt?”

“Yes! Yes, everything is just... _ fine _ ,” Newt remembers to give her his best smile of reassurance and knows even as he does so that it’s entirely unconvincing. Her expression confirms as much, but before she can protest he’s set the case behind the chair and is already lifting the lid to begin his descent.

“Well-, Newt! Good night then?” Tina calls after him.

“Good night, Tina,” he calls over his shoulder. “Thank you for dinner.”

There’s a bottle of whisky in one of his drawers downstairs, and it’s this he’s thinking of as he pulls the lid of the case closed behind him. It’s old, and he’s not touched it in what, nearly five years? But alcohol doesn’t go off, does it? And he has a feeling that whisky is exactly what’s called for tonight. He reaches up and draws the bolt across, locking the case firmly from the inside, and goes in search of his whisky.

  
  


*

 

There had been more whisky left in the bottle than Newt remembered. A bottle given to him by his brother no less, for some celebration or other, he can’t even remember any more. Newt’s never much liked whisky, always preferred port, but he’ll take what he can get right now, and at this moment it’s worked a treat. The letter lies opened and deliberately discarded on the bench in front of him, the white cardboard and gilt lettering gleaming in the lamplight. Newt leans back in his chair feeling the warmth of the alcohol make his thoughts slow and a pleasant heat spread through his limbs. The bottle is significantly more empty than it had been when he started. 

He doesn’t want to think right now, because the moment he saw that handwriting the old despair had risen up in him, like a dormant poison ready to stir back to life when exposed to the air. Horrible feelings, awful reaction, and no matter what it still gets him. No matter how many years it’s been, or how far he comes in his life, there’s always going to be that memory of old grievances, old mistakes, and all the damned mess of emotions that come with them. 

And now he’s been rude to Tina when he’s a guest in her home, abandoning her the moment they got back, and- he can’t bring himself to do anything about it. He just can’t take Tina’s concerned looks or Queenie’s probing, and he simply cannot suffer them to pull this mess out of him and pore over it whether or not he wants them to. Because they will, it’s in both their natures to do so.

There’s a creak of floorboards and he turns his head to the open door of the shed. The jaguar stands there, a darkness against the glow of the lamps outside, his golden eyes watchful. 

“Hullo, Nox. Have you forgiven me yet?” Newt has no idea why the familiar had been ignoring him earlier. He’s been particularly moody these past two days, and Newt is both baffled and a little hurt by it. Perhaps he’s missing his old master, he thinks. Maybe it just needs time. “Time’s up though, isn’t it?” he says. “Time to pay the piper.”

Newt laughs, because he’s drunk, and then dashes the back of his hand across his eyes. Yes, more drunk than he should be. Pathetic really. He pushes himself to his feet, brings the bottle with him, and leaves the letter, forgotten, on the bench.

“Come on, old chap,” he says. “Come keep me company.”

  
  


*

  
  


_ He’s drunk _ , Percival realises, with some surprise. 

Newt smells of whisky and tobacco, and the mingled scents of a downtown restaurant. He catches the muted scent of the perfume Tina wears, and the interesting tang of the beef they’d eaten for dinner, then Newt is upon him, crowding him back out of the door with a palm flat on the top of his head. 

“Come on, come on, move along,” Newt says to him. “I want to go sit and watch the birds.”

Percival shuffles back out of the way, keeping to one side as Newt veers a little drunkenly towards him, rights himself, then jumps down the rest of the steps with a clumsy form of grace. 

_ Hm, _ Percival thinks. He’s never seen the man act like this before, and he’s not sure he likes it. There’s no drunken good cheer to him, only a maudlin sort of humour, the type that comes with a bitterly sharp edge to it. Curious, and a little alarmed, he follows as Newt leads the way across the yard and up the little grassy slope to sit beneath the copper Abiascus tree. Newt folds himself down bonelessly into a cross-legged position, then sits, his bottle forgotten in one hand, gazing out across the enclosures. Percival’s absolutely certain it’s not the brightly coloured birds he’s watching, for his eyes don’t follow their flitting movements, but some inner, more troubling vision.

Cautiously, Percival sits down next to him, and immediately Newt slings an arm around his neck, leaning into his side and pressing his cheek against Percival’s fur. “I should have known, Nox. I mean, I did know, I  _ did _ know. But I didn’t think, you know…I’m stupid. I’m very stupid.”

Percival shifts uncomfortably - he’s never much appreciated the company of drunks, and he’s not yet entirely certain what the purpose of all this is. “I’m sure you’re not,” he offers, wondering how easily he can extract himself to a safe distance. 

“I’ve known for years about this,  _ years _ , you know? Years. But it doesn’t make any difference, does it?”

_ Oh good grief, _ Percival thinks. 

“And I should want them to be happy- I do! I do want them to be happy, I just, can’t they just go and be happy where I’m not?” Newt shakes his head against Percival’s side, fingers digging into the ruff of his neck fur. “Leave me out of it. I don’t want anything to do with it anymore.”

Percival has narrowed his eyes. This is starting to sound very much like either a family, or, more likely, a romantic crisis. Neither of which he should probably listen to, all things considered. Still, Newt has something close to a deathgrip on his fur, so much so that it’s actually starting to become mildly uncomfortable. 

“But Theseus doesn’t care, does he? Theseus gets what Theseus wants, and damn everyone else! And I suppose Mother and Father are both over the moon. The Lestranges are such good family, aren’t they? Oh Nox, I hate this. I’m so bitter and it’s awful, I’m awful, Nox. It’s all awful. I don’t want to go to their bloody wedding. How can I even show my face?”

“Oh right, hang on just a moment there _ ,” _ Percival says to him. “Theseus is getting married? To a...Lestrange? Where have I heard that name before…?”

“Yes, I know, I’m terrible.”

“What? No, stop it. Get a grip, Newton. Which Lestrange is it?” Percival twists his head around to look at Newt, and the man buries his face in his fur, almost shoving them both over. “Wait, Mercy Lewis, are you crying?”

For a split-second Percival feels cripplingly embarrassed. He’s not a man to easily reveal his weaker emotions, although he’ll admit to himself and perhaps one other close friend that he has them, and to be confronted by another man’s vulnerability still, even after all these years as an auror, throws him somewhat. He’s accustomed to people’s grief, to their pain and their fear and their moments of insanity - it all comes with the job - but there’s a difference between dealing with such emotions in a professional setting and within an intimate one. Newt is...not a friend of course. No, but- Percival shakes his head, thrown off course by this turn of events and the turning of his thoughts.

“Sorry,” Newt sniffs, scrubbing at his face with his sleeve. “Am I hurting you? I didn’t mean to dig my fingers in, sorry, Nox. I’m sorry.”

“All right, don’t be silly now, it’s not a big deal,” Percival murmurs, and sniffs at the tears on Newt’s cheek. They smell of salt, and he has to turn his head to the side to stop his tongue from licking them away. Damned jaguar form, it’s really not helping right now.

Newt rubs at the jaguar’s neck where he’s been gripping him tightly, and makes an unhappy humming noise in his throat. “Sorry, old chap. I’m being silly, aren’t I? You can tell me off, it’s all right. I’m an idiot and I don’t even know why I let them get to me like this. It’s just- ….every time this comes up it leads to a fight. I’m still not forgiven for all those years ago, you know. I had to have private tuition after I got expelled and Father’s never let me forget it. But no son of his was going to walk away from magic, not that I was going to! I just, you know he makes me so bloody angry too. Like I’d have given up. I don’t give up, Nox, I’m not some weakling. I would have studied on my own- I did! I did study on my own. I was doing fine anyway.”

Percival’s not so sure about that, but he holds his tongue. At least the tears have stopped now, for which he’s very glad. The sight of such a thing had stirred in him a strange sort of anger and affrontment, a kind of horror at the thought of this man being moved to such a state. Newt’s a gentle soul, albeit a little too lax with his own personal safety, and Percival finds the idea of his being moved from his usual good cheer by anything to be really rather discomforting. 

“You know,” Newt continues, wiping his palm down Percival’s shoulder to clean away the wetness. “I haven’t even spoken to Leta in years. Really,  _ years. _ There’s just no reason to feel this way, and yet-...and yet. Just...every time I think about all this I’m filled with this, this  _ regret. _ This  _ despair. _ Everything was so awful back then, and I just want to forget it ever happened, and now this. Like some bloody inevitable  _ thing _ , you know? Like, unstoppable.”

_ Leta, _ Percival thinks, triumphantly. That was it, the girl from Hogwarts. The one that got him expelled. It had all been in the files, though most of the detail had been inserted firmly between the lines for the reader to pick out for themselves. It surprises him somewhat just how hard Newt is taking this news, though of course, thinking about it, he supposes it is somewhat of a mess. Your older brother, already favoured by the family, taking up with the girl that put such a dent in your life so early on. He looks at Newt, at this strange man with his gentle nature and hidden spine of steel, and thinks  _ well bollocks to that. _

“I just feel like whatever I do, I can never get away from the past, Nox. And I don’t know what I’m supposed to do about it. No matter how far I go, how little contact I have, it always come back. And I just wish I were stronger. Better, you know? Not so bloody chained to the past, like an idiot.” Newt shakes his head, and looks down at the bottle, somewhere less than a third left now. He frowns at it in disgust, then throws it away, sending it rolling down the hill, spilling whisky on the grass until it comes to a glugging, clinking halt on the stony path below, emptying what’s left of its contents on the floor. Newt lies back on the grass with a thump, staring up at the softly chiming copper leaves of the tree waving gently above him. “I don’t feel well,” he mutters. Then, “I’m an idiot.”

“All right, come on now,” Percival says. “You’re not an idiot. Your damned brother should have known better than to what, send an invite? He should have damned well come in person, like a man. Talked it out with you. Come on now, Newt.”

With a sigh, Percival stretches out alongside Newt, letting his tail lie across the man’s knees. Newt reaches up an arm and hooks it around the side of his neck, his fingers finding the jaguar's ear and kneading softly. For a second, Percival just lets him do it. Even while drunk the man is supremely good at finding just the right spot, but then he tilts his head to dislodge those fingers: there’s only so much of that he can tolerate. Newt can be just a little  _ too _ good at it, and Percival draws the line at letting himself drool blissfully all over someone. If he wants a massage he can go get one when he’s back in his human form. Besides, it’s not what he’s here for right now. Newt needs, if not someone to keep him from drinking himself silly, then at least someone to make sure he doesn’t choke on his own vomit later. He doesn’t seem too bad right now, but he’s quite a lean man, and that smells like it was an awful lot of whisky he put away earlier.

Newt has let his eyes fall closed, and his hand has gone still on Percival’s neck. His breathing has that slightly thick quality of the somewhat drunk, and Percival thinks from the rhythm of it that he’s already gone half to sleep. He looks down at the dozing man and shakes his head. It’s harder to tell in this form, but like this he looks so much younger and less careworn than his age. Twenty-nine is hardly old; Percival has some fifteen years on him, a number that makes him wince, but he can’t tell if it’s a certain ambiguity of age that makes Newt seem a bit younger, or simply his own inability to accurately discern such things in this form. Still. Twenty-nine and without a longterm romantic partner - Percival is starting to wonder if Newt allows himself to even think of such things. The man has such potential, such  _ charm _ , it’s extraordinary that he’s still alone. 

Perhaps it’s a choice, Percival muses. Or then again, considering this outburst tonight, perhaps it’s a hang-up from the past. Maybe Newt just needs someone to show him a good time, so to speak. Help him shake off these fears he’s been carrying around with him for so long. Someone with a bit of experience, and all the confidence that goes with it. Someone that can take the inevitable wobbles and crises of confidence in their stride. He tilts his head and watches Newt’s fingers twitch where they rest on his chest. The man is kind and caring, funny and interesting. A hard worker, utterly dedicated to his creatures. He’s... _ nurturing, _ and Percival finds that oddly charming in a man. Of course, he’s also erratic and deeply irresponsible at times, but still, with a little bit of discipline, well. Who’s to say where such things might end up?

Amused by his own thoughts, Percival snorts and shakes his head. Clearly he’s spent too long cooped up down here. Someone up in the real world really needs to get their ass in gear and trigger those system flags so he can get out and get back to being Director again. Then he can let this terrible tension twisting inside of himself go, and be free of the ever-mounting sense that he’s once again been trapped by his own foolishness.

_ Breathe _ , he thinks, and does just that, closing his eyes and letting the mounting anger slip away. 

At his side, Newt stirs slightly, hiccoughs, and then slides back into sleep. The immediate crisis appears to be over, high drama reduced to rasping snores by the soporific effects of a bloodstream thoroughly flooded with alcohol. Percival sighs out a long breath, shifts himself so that he’s lying more comfortably, and settles down to wait out the night.  

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some cheeky sod needs to buy Percival a "Bad Kitty" t-shirt. He'd never wear it, but the black look on his face when he opened it would be worth the price!
> 
> Next chapter is end of part 1. (Yes, we're a chapter shy of halfway and we're already sailing merrily past 32k.)
> 
> Thank you, as ever, to everyone reading, I hope you're still enjoying. :]


	6. The Cat is Out of the Case

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Someone, finally, lets the cat out of the case.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Damned straight I’m reusing background characters! All the cool people do it. :P

The hallways of the upper offices are lunch hour quiet when Tina makes her way through the Major Crimes bullpen. Alvarez is at her desk, rolling a quill between thumb and forefinger as she looks thoughtfully down at her paperwork. She glances up as Tina approaches and raises an eyebrow.

“Did you get the Roselyn Rue quarter report in?” she asks idly, a mentor checking up on an apprentice that’s already well past the need for her attention.

Tina lifts up the folder she’s carrying for Alvarez to see. “That’s where I’m going now. Is he in?”

“In his office,” Alvarez confirms. “By the way, Harris was talking about drinks tonight again. You want to bring that English boy of yours along? Everyone’s curious.”

“I know they are,” Tina says, still walking. “They’ll just have to carry on being curious.”

She hears Alvarez laugh behind her, and smiles as she continues to weave her way through the empty desks towards the corridor at the rear of the bullpen. It’s been just under six months since she moved up here, and the place is starting to feel like home. The rest of the team have never been anything but welcoming, but still, there’s a difference between being friendly and being a part of the team, and these days Tina’s starting to feel like she actually belongs. It’s a good feeling.

MACUSA’s Assistant Director of Magical Security has his office along the corridor that leads from the rear of the bullpen, next to the forensics labs. Major Incidents and its component teams has its own set of everything, and although Tina had once considered this a little self-indulgent of them, a few months spent working up here has opened her eyes to just how much the extra resource is needed. The sort of work that goes on up here simply cannot be carried out in the general labs, and although the MI forensics staff have a bit of a reputation for superiority complexes, their confidence is not unfounded. She passes two labs on her left before she reaches the Assistant Director’s office, and knocks gently.

“Enter!”

The voice has a distinctly English clip to it, but the tone suggests cheerfulness rather than impatience. She straightens her coat, then opens the door and steps inside.

Ibrahim Ismail keeps his office in a state of constant and unrepentant untidiness, the tools of his speciality adorning every surface in cluttered disarray. Alembics and cauldrons, books and vials are everywhere, and set between them seemingly at random are potted plants and little flowering bushes, all with some use in potions making. The Assistant Director himself, a handsome, dark-haired man in his late fifties, looks up at her from his writing and lifts a hand to gesture her to a chair.

Tina smiles and moves to shift a pile of books from the seat before sitting down. She likes Ismail, although his rank has prevented her from really having all that much contact with him. He’s an intelligent, cheerful sort, more like the kind of man you’d expect to find teaching at Ilvermorny rather than running the country’s Major Crimes unit. He’d come back from his travels not long before she’d been made a member of Major Crimes - come out of retirement to help out MACUSA after Grindelwald had sent his predecessor to an early grave. He’s an old friend of Percival Graves according to the scuttlebutt around the office, and Tina still remembers him from years before when he’d been with MACUSA the first time round, working alongside Graves as his second in command. One warrior, one thinker, or so their reputations went anyway.

“I have the report, Mr Ismail,” she says. “The Rosemary Rue quarterly.”

“Ah, yes. And how is our delightful curse-wrangler, hm?” Ismail takes the folder from her and opens it to flick through the sheets within.

“Still wrangling,” Tina says disapprovingly. “Still just on the right side of the law, but I know she’s covering for someone, sir. I can _feel_ it.”

Ismail hums thoughtfully, but he doesn’t disagree. Rosemary Rue is Tina’s long term assignment, a witch of longstanding ill repute, operating just inside the bounds of the acceptable. It would be an easy case, usually given over to the general auror teams if not for the connections the witch has. It makes her a useful barometer for certain trends in the shadowy side of the magical community, and as such an important tool in their predictive arsenal.

Tina sits back and waits while Ismail gives the report a quick look over. She can hear something rattling softly on one of the little tables set around the edge of the room, and realises after a moment that it’s a kettle. It reminds her that she hasn’t seen Newt yet this morning. He’s the only other serious tea drinker she knows, and she can’t help but think of him every time she sees one of those little china teapots.

She must have sighed too sharply at the thought of Newt and his behaviour last night, for when she turns her attention back to her commanding officer he’s looked up from his reading to regard her. “Everything quite all right, Tina?” he asks, with one raised eyebrow.

“Oh! Yes, I was just,” she shrugs. “Your tea. It reminds me of Newt. I mean, he drinks tea too. A lot. A _lot_ of tea.”

 _Try not to sound like a complete idiot,_ _Tina,_ she thinks to herself crossly. As much as she likes the Assistant Director she’s well aware of her own tendency to become flustered around authority, even now.

“Quite right too,” Ismail murmurs, then looks back down at the report. “And how is Newt?”

“Newt? Oh, yes. He’s good. Very good. Very...Newt.”

Again, Ismail looks up at her, eyebrows raised. “I trust he’s not running you girls ragged? He has quite the reputation for dramatic escapades.” This last is said with quite some relish, and Tina turns her eyes briefly heavenward. Newt’s reputation around the auror office seems to go one of two ways. Either he meets with flat-out disapproval, or he’s vaunted as a mad genius whose adventures are told and retold over drinks after work by those who deem themselves lucky enough to have been present at the capture of Grindelwald last year. Ismail, for all his rank, has a streak of the mischievous a mile wide, and he falls firmly, yet just about discreetly, into the latter camp.

“Oh well, you know Newt,” she says, which he doesn’t of course. “I mean, he’s not doing anything wrong. I am keeping an eye on him! But, well, he’s already managed to find something out of the ordinary.”

Ismail lowers the report slightly and looks at her with interest. Tina hesitates, but Ismail, for all his rank, has never seemed to be anything but a genuine man. “He found someone’s passport out in the woods, and ah, something of theirs. And he brought it back with him because he couldn’t find the person.”

“Very civic-minded of him,” Ismail comments.

“Yes, well,” Tina mutters. “He has his moments. I don’t suppose you’ve ever heard of an ‘Alastair Sinclair’ have you?”

Very carefully, Ismail sets the report back down on the desk and folds his hands in front of him, one over the other. He eyes Tina intently, then says, “Alastair Sinclair?”

She nods, wondering how he knows the name, because his sudden interest tells her that something about it is familiar to him. “Yes,” she continues carefully, wary of dropping Newt into any kind of hot water. “He’d left his documents in the forest, uh, Superior National Forest? North-west of here? Newt was up there doing a controlled release, and, well. He found the guy’s familiar.”

“Oh?” Ismail says softly.

“It brought him the documents, and he couldn’t find the guy, so he brought the familiar back with him. I’m uh, running the passport through the system now to see if it turns anything up. I’m pretty sure it’ll flag something somewhere. I mean, the familiar, it’s a jaguar of all things.”

Ismail’s face has gone very still, and Tina wonders again who this Alastair must be to provoke such a reaction.

“Uh, it’s safe down in his case, sir. He’s not let it go running wild, I mean he says it’s house trained and whatever. Perfectly _safe_ , but it stays down in his case until we can track the owner.”

Ismail looks down at the report, then very suddenly gathers the paperwork together, raps it sharply on the desk to align it, before closing the folder and setting it aside. He turns a bright smile on Tina and says, “Miss Goldstein, would you mind terribly if I were to ask you to introduce me to this new familiar of Newt’s?”

Suddenly Tina doesn’t like the look of amusement hiding in her superior’s eyes - there’s something going on here, and she’s not sure whether _she’s_ suddenly become the butt of some joke, or Newt. Caution makes her stammer a little in uncertainty, and she curses herself mentally for it. “Well, I- I’m not really allowed men in the apartment...I mean, Newt’s not, the landlady doesn’t really know-”

“Miss Goldstein, I assure you, I am the very soul of discretion,” Ismail says smoothly, and against his confidence and rank, Tina has no defence.

“Now, shall we?” he asks brightly.

 

*

 

Newt reaches for the first mug that comes to hand, and almost knocks it flying off the shelf. “Bugger!” he hisses, scrambling to catch it before it hits the floor. Luck sees him hook a finger through the handle just in time, but he still has to simply stand for a moment, leaning against the dresser, as his head pounds in response to the sudden flurry of movement. He really ought not to have drunk so much last night.

With a wince he straightens and lets the scent of strong coffee focus his efforts. Newt’s not usually one for the stuff, certainly not the way the Americans drink it, but right now he needs a pick-me-up and he’s all out of ingredients for a decent hangover cure. In truth it’s not the sort of thing he normally has need of.  

The Goldsteins’ apartment is quiet, Queenie off down the corridor in the shower, and Tina at work. Newt’s glad for their absence, he’s still not up to discussing the contents of the letter with either of them, and lacks the mental discipline right now to deal with Queenie’s probing. He rubs a hand across his eyes and carefully pours himself a large mug of coffee. That damned invite. He’s going to have to answer it soon. What he wants to do is tear it up and throw it away, or send his brother a pithy response involving strong reference to him being quite happy to repeatedly stick his foot up Theseus’ backside until his brother gets the point.

Of course, Newt will do neither of those things. He will go because that’s the way he is, a peacekeeper no matter what he feels, and he’ll do what he has to in order to endure the day, then as soon as he’s able to he’ll make his escape. To Peru this time perhaps, he’s heard they have a breed of Woppachick there he’d really like to include in his next book. Or maybe he’ll accept the invitation and take Nox as his plus one. Perhaps they’ll all leave him alone if he brings the familiar along to guard him. Nox can be rather intimidating when he wants to be, even if Newt has to tie a fascinator around his neck to make him appropriately wedding-themed. One specifically poisonous to humans maybe.

Newt takes a sip of scalding hot coffee and winces at the bitter taste. Truly vile. On the other hand he probably deserves it after that embarrassing bout of self-pity last night. He closes his eyes and shakes his head. At least Tina let him be, and Nox was therefore the only creature around to see him make such a spectacular weeping fool of himself. _Honestly, Newt,_ he thinks. _Why do you always do this to yourself?_

Still, at least he hadn’t woken up in too dreadful a state. He’d spent the night under the Abiascus tree, Nox curled next to him for warmth. A quick rinse under the shower rigged up by the shed had sorted out the scent of sweat and jaguar clinging to him, and woken him right up. Rather unpleasantly so actually. On the other hand Nox hadn’t seemed to mind the cold water, and Newt had let it run for him while he dug out everyone’s breakfast.

Newt has become very accustomed to sharing his living space with Nox now. The jaguar is an ever-present companion on his rounds, a polite partner for meals, and a watchful sentinel at night. His presence has become more than just reassuring, it’s started to seem entirely natural. He’s not a young jaguar by any definition, and the idea has started to creep into Newt’s thoughts that maybe he could be the one to give the familiar a quiet home in his twilight years. He’s probably got another five or six years left in him, maybe more if he stays healthy, and if Newt were to adopt him - should of course his current owner not be traced - then it would be a partnership that would benefit the both of them.

He’s still daydreaming about this, wondering if maybe he could let Nox out to stretch his legs up here for a while, when he hears footsteps in the stairwell. The walls are quite thin around here, and the building set up in such a way that sound travels much further than it ought to. He tilts his head to listen, thinking that it’s too early for Tina to be home, and yet that sounds very much like her tread and that’s definitely the distinctive clink of her keys. Well, it’s probably for the best. He can ask her if she’s found out anything about the mysterious Alastair Sinclair, and it would probably be best if he made at least some attempt to apologise for his behaviour last night.

The key clatters in the lock, and then the door opens, and Tina steps inside. She is, much to Newt’s surprise, not alone. For a long second he blinks at the tall stranger behind her, smartly dressed in an expensive dark suit, and carrying around him that indefinable look of an auror.

“Good afternoon, Mr Scamander,” the man smiles.

“Um, Newt?” Tina says, giving Newt a look that clearly says _don’t do anything embarrassing!_ “Could you, ah, go and get Nox?”

“Nox?” Newt replies, confused and still a little slow despite the coffee.

“Nox?” the stranger echoes, a look of delight on his face. “Is that what you call him? Well now, that is absolutely marvellous.”

Newt’s not sure he likes the sound of that, and he doesn’t for a single moment trust the smile on this man’s face. There’s something entirely too much like amusement there, and he can’t for the life of him think what’s so funny. Nox is a damned fine name, thank you very much.

“ _Newt_ ,” Tina presses. “The _Assistant Director_ is here about Alastair Sinclair. You have his familiar in your case.”

 _Ah, right,_ Newt thinks. _That explains that then._

“Uhm, yes,” he says, trying to give the man a surreptitious look up and down. Unfortunately, the man’s widening smile tells him that he’s failed in his attempts at subtlety. Still, there’s likely only one reason he’s here, and that’s to talk ‘dangerous’ beasts and how Newt shouldn’t have brought Nox to the city, and so forth and so on. “Right, yes. I’ve looked after him, and I can continue to do so until Mr Sinclair is found. I’m a fully trained magizoologist, but my qualifications extend to animal husbandry in general, and I have cared for very similar creatures in the past. There’s really no need to be concerned for his health, he’s in peak condition. And of course, he’s perfectly well socialised, not a threat to anyone.”

“My dear boy,” the man murmurs. “I have absolutely no doubt about that.”

It’s then that Queenie returns, and in the ensuing confusion Tina gives Newt a sharp glare to send him on his way. Under the cover of greetings and renewed pleasantries, for apparently Queenie is quite familiar with this man whose name he hasn’t even been given, Newt makes his escape. There’s a strange heaviness in his heart as he unlocks the lid of his travelling home, a feeling that no matter what he says now, matters are going to be taken out of his hands. Nox will be processed in keeping with rules and regulations, and Newt’s earlier daydreaming will be relegated entirely to self-indulgence. Grimly, he hopes someone in MACUSA sees sense, though experience has taught him not to hold out hope.

  


*

 

It’s some time close to mid-afternoon when Percival hears Newt coming back down the ladder into the case. It’s far too early for feeding or the evening rounds, and Newt’s been largely absent during the daytime since they got back to New York, so this is somewhat unusual. He lifts his head from his paws and looks down from his perch to find Newt already at the shed’s door looking up for him.

“Nox! Come on, fella, get down here.”

 _This sounds promising,_ Percival thinks, the first stirrings of excitement making his paws light as he leaps down from the branch. He hurries across the yard, and up the stairs past Newt who closes the shed door behind him, and for the first time in Percival’s experience, locks it too. Percival looks up at him and thinks that there’s something perhaps a little grim and determined behind his expression of neutrality today, none of his usual good cheer present, as though he’s deliberately trying not to seem concerned. Something has _definitely_ happened.

“Righto, fella. We’re going upstairs. Follow me.”

Newt leads the way up the ladder, and, hope rising in his breast, Percival gives him a moment to get clear, then leaps up the ladder after him. He emerges into bright afternoon sunlight that fills the sisters’ apartment, and as soon as he he scents the air he knows from the familiar tang of tobacco and sandalwood that the game is finally at an end.

“Uhm, so, this is him,” Newt says. “As you can see he’s very well socialised, so he’s really not a threat at all.”

There are three other people in the room with Newt: both Goldstein sisters and a man, the sight of whom makes relief flood through Percival’s veins. Even though a sudden, fierce bloom of embarrassment follows hot on the tail of it, he can still admit, at least to himself, that he’d begun to doubt. He notices that the visitor’s mouth has twisted into something resembling an amused but still somewhat concerned smile. Inexplicably annoyed, Percival glares up at him and growls, “ _Finally.”_

“Hello, old man,” Ismail replies softly. “What in Merlin’s name are you playing at?”

 

*

 

There’s a moment of silence that stretches, on and on, in which everyone stares at the jaguar, save Newt, who looks from face to face, confused.

“Oh no…” says Tina quietly, and a moment later Queenie gasps, her hand flying to her mouth as she picks up her sister’s thoughts. “Mr Graves!” she exclaims.

Both sisters stare at the jaguar, Tina in outright dismay, and Queenie with face as pale as one of her newly pressed sheets. Newt, confused both by their reactions and by the strange half-smile on this new auror’s face, continues to look from person to person, then back at the familiar standing quietly beside him.

“Mr Graves…?” he asks them, hoping for some kind of explanation.

Ismail is silent, still thoughtful, but at his words Tina seems to snap out of her horrified trance.

“Oh. Oh, yes,” she says. “Mr Graves is-,” and here she shoots a glance to the Assistant Director who’s still staring with tilted head at the jaguar. Seeing no rescue there, she continues, “-he’s an animagus. I mean, not many people know that. And, it’s not really...sir, I’m so sorry. I just, I didn’t realise you, I mean, I’ve never seen-”

“How can he be?” Queenie demands, interrupting her sister, her voice sharp with rising panic. “I can’t read him!”

“He’s cursed,” Ismail says thoughtfully.

A slow creep of horror has been winding its way through Newt’s veins from the moment Tina had uttered the word ‘animagus’. His stomach feels as though it’s ready to pool into his feet and every muscle in his body has gone tense. There’s a weird shaking sensation in his head, like he’s suddenly gone dizzy and for one awful moment he thinks he’s going to faint.

_Percival Graves. MACUSA’s Director of Magical Security. In his case. His jaguar. Nox. An animagus._

He can see from Tina’s face and Ismail’s thoughtful expression that this is no joke. In his head all he can think of are the last few days. What has he said? What has he done? What has Nox - _Graves -_ heard? Seen? Fucking Merlin’s balls-

“Oh no...no, no, no, no, no.”

It takes him a moment to realise that he’s saying the words out loud, and as Nox, no, fucking _Percival Graves,_ turns his head to look up at him, Newt takes a horrified step back and away.

Ismail, seeing the reaction, takes a quick step forward and goes smoothly down on one knee before the jaguar, mercifully drawing his attention away from Newt. The Assistant Director holds a palm out over Percival’s head, fingers splayed, and begins to read his aura. The rest of them stand and watch him with varying degrees of horror. Newt is pressed back against the nearest sofa, unable to retreat any further, while Tina stands, cheeks burning with embarrassment, and at her side Queenie presses a handkerchief to her mouth, her eyes wide and frightened behind it.

“Yes, that is quite the curse, old man,” Ismail murmurs. “What _have_ you been doing?”

Percival, standing stiffly amidst all this, makes an impatient grunting sound, and glares up at his second in command as though willing him to get on with it. Ismail raises one eyebrow at the intensity of the jaguar’s stare. “I can remove it, but I think,” he says tactfully, looking up and taking in the atmosphere of the room, “That it would be best if this were done in private.”

“Mr Graves, I’m so sorry,” Tina whispers, but Ismail waves her apology away.

“Now Tina, there’s nothing to apologise for. I’m sure the Director has a perfectly reasonable explanation for remaining undercover like this. We’ll discuss it tomorrow. Now, ladies, Mr Scamander, very good to meet you by the way, if you don’t mind I think we’ll be on our way. Come along, old man.”

Receiving no objections, Ismail leads his jaguar-shaped Director of Magical Security to the door, opens it for him, and then with one final nod to them all, whisks them both away in a short, sharp, twist of magic. In the resulting silence the sisters and Newt are left to stare at one another in dismay.

“Newt,” Tina begins, then sees her sister’s face. “Queenie, what’s wrong? Why are you crying?”

“Oh, Teenie,” her sister gasps. There are tears on her cheek, and her hands are tightly clenched around her handkerchief. “He saw Jacob. He _saw_ him.”

“What…?” Tina breathes. “Newt, did you? Newt!”

But Newt does not reply. Face as pale as Queenie’s, he shakes his head and won’t meet either of their gazes. Almost tripping over a footstool, he stumbles his way around the sofa, back to his case, and without a word, climbs back inside. He pulls the lid closed behind him, and the sound of the locks snapping back into place is sharp with finality in the otherwise silent apartment.

 

*

 

“You sniffed it, didn’t you?”

Percival Graves, human in form, reaches his arms above his head and stretches every muscle in his body. He can feel the warm swell of his magic swirling in his belly and flowing liquid through his limbs, just as it ought to. He can sense the prickle-hum of the magical shielding on his office, hear the soft whine of active spells on his collection of arcane gadgetry, and feel with his magic the webbing of power that lies over and around them, from the chitter of the communications spells out in the corridor, to the deep and sonorous groan of the wider shielding of the building itself. Mercy Lewis it’s good to be back.

He ignores Ibrahim, instead taking a quick walk around the perimeter of his office to get used to the balance of two legs again. They’d used Ismail’s clearance to get them into one of the building’s secure inner apparition points, then ghosted themselves through the corridors to Percival’s office, wrapped up in notice-me-nots. Now, Ismail sits in the corner chair watching him pace, his work as curse-breaker complete.

“But you did sniff it though, didn’t you?”  
  
“I was investigating the hoard and I accidentally touch-”

“I _knew_ it! You just can’t help yourself, can you?”

“Shut the hell up, Ibrahim,” Percival replies cheerfully, too filled with relief to rise to his baiting today. “What I need now is to know if Freddie Goodfellow is in New York or not. He’s had enough time to get back by now; I doubt he took a cheap train back, he’s not the sort. And I need to know if he’s brought that damned amulet back with him. We can’t leave him running loose with that thing, who knows what trouble it will bring.”

He comes to a halt before his second, flexing his fingers and bouncing lightly on the balls of his feet. He’ll need a change of clothes too, freshening spells only go so far, but for now just the feel of being back to human is keeping him in a state of light-hearted elation.  

“I’ll get Alvarez straight on it,” Ismail replies, pushing himself to his feet. “Now, in all seriousness, Percy, you need to keep an eye on yourself. Let me know immediately if you notice any further-”

“I know the drill, Ibe,” Percival cuts in, with a shake of his head.

“So how long did you spend down in Mr Scamander’s case? Was it six days eating raw rabbit and pissing in a litter tray or seven?”

Percival glares at his second in command, and Ibrahim returns the look with a placid smile.

“So,” Ismail continues. “Keep a record of anything out of the ordinary and inform me at once. I can’t see any immediate lingering curse damage but this isn’t my curse, and you of all people know how damned difficult it is to solve someone else’s weaving.”

“Fine,” Percival growls, feeling his cheeks redden despite himself. “And it wasn’t a goddamned litter tray. Newt’s got a very fine setup going on down there, very sophisticated.”

 _Does he now?_ Ismail’s raised eyebrows seem to say.

“Now, Mr Ismail,” Percival says stiffly. “If you’ve quite finished embarrassing me, I have a crook to track down and a very harsh lesson to dole out. Would you care to accompany me?”

“With _pleasure_ , Mr Graves,” Ismail replies, and the twin smiles of the two old aurors promise vengeance of a truly inspired nature on one very unfortunate Frederick Goodfellow.

 

*

 

There's a light scattering of snow all across the city by the time Percival Graves finally makes it to bed that night. His crook remains unapprehended, but he has the best of his aurors on the trail, and all confidence that the moment the man peeks his head above the proverbial parapet one of them will pounce and bring him in. And if instead he's unexpectedly wise and keeps his head down, Percival fully intends to do some digging of his own and yank him up regardless. He has a number of burning questions to put to a man that smuggles dangerous artefacts around, not least of which is what the hell it was that laid Percival so spectacularly low all those days ago.

Earlier, under Ibrahim's watchful and discerning eye, they’d done some further testing, and he'd once more taken on his jaguar form to confirm that he could again switch freely between the two. That first transformation back had been a tense moment, but as far as Percival can see there's no further blockages to his ability. They had concluded, with some confusion and no little wariness, that it had been a temporary muting of his powers and agreed to simply monitor the situation.

It's with great pleasure Percival slides beneath his bed covers that night. His townhouse is a welcome retreat from the demands of his professional life, and after several weeks undercover, followed by another few weeks of enforced and unwelcome undercover recovery, he's thoroughly glad to be back amongst civilisation, with all the amenities he cherishes. As capable as Percival may be on field work that takes him outside his city, he's somewhat a creature of modern comforts, and isn't shy about admitting it.

Still, when he extinguishes the lamps that night with a muttered _nox_ spell, he has to smile to himself. Newt's name for him is going to haunt him for the rest of his life, he's sure. Not that he holds anything against the man, had it not been for Newt's efforts he'd probably still be stuck in the wilderness, or, he thinks grimly, most likely long dead. No, he owes Newt for his part in assisting him, and thanking him in person would be the polite thing to do. Besides, after a week in his company enjoying his hospitality Percival finds himself rather wanting to meet the man face to face, man to man, so to speak, rather than man to jaguar. It will give him a chance to thank him properly, and, perhaps, if it doesn't seem too forward, pursue some kind of friendship with him. _Or more_ , a small part of him tags on.

 _Hm_ , Percival thinks to himself. _I must really be exhausted to be thinking along those lines._

But are you? that same voice asks. Really? How was it you thought of him the other night? Kind, intelligent, _charming_...? Lying back on the bed, staring up at the ceiling, Percival shakes his head at himself. He's far too old for this. Far too old for Newt. But still, still…the idea sticks in his mind, tumbling over and around as he prods at it, and refuses to fade away.

He falls asleep that night thinking of it still, of all the many possibilities life has to offer. But mostly he thinks of Newt, lying on his back beneath the Abiascus tree, arm around Percival's neck and face turned peaceful in sleep, the warm line of his body pressed against Percival's own. As a jaguar it had meant little; as a man, other possibilities begin to rise to the fore.

Later, deep in the small hours of the morning, he dreams, and the dreams are of Newt's laugh, of the scent of him, and the unrestrained enthusiasm he has for his strange, nomadic life. And later still, as the moon, hidden behind a veil of cloud cover, nonetheless begins to set, he hears once more that strange rhythm, as of the ocean beating cold against a far-distant shore, and threaded amongst it a voice whose speech he cannot make out over the cracking of the ice. He wakes, frozen to the bone and convinced that he's drowning, only to find himself drenched in sweat and shivering in his bed.

The fire in the grate has long since gone dark, and he kindles it to life with a word, pulling the blankets tight around himself. He falls back to sleep listening to the soft crackle of flames, and hearing the muted buzz of New York’s nightlife outside his window. If he dreams again that night, by morning he no longer remembers it.

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that, friends, is the end of part 1. Posted a little early as I’m away on a trip this weekend.
> 
> Part 2 contains actual human!Percival attempting that 8 o’clock dinner date. Which is going to go about as well as can be expected, all things considered.
> 
> Thank you all so much for reading and for all your encouragement! 
> 
> Here are some videos I’ve been working off for inspiration as I’ve written the last few chapters - there are an amazing amount of jaguar videos on Youtube. My recommended videos list is now either forever destroyed or forever perfect, I can’t decide.
> 
>  
> 
> [One very fine ear scritching vid.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPMi136tURg)  
> [I just need you to look at this video of a jaguar having a bath, okay?](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6jRsXvxK4I)


	7. Awkward Reintroductions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Percival comes to a realisation, Newt is wary. Luckily, there's a plan.

 

**Part 2 - Dinner at 8, maybe?**

 

The stairwell that leads up to the Goldstein’s apartment smells of damp. Percival wrinkles his nose at the scent, and wonders why the pair of them are still renting in this run-down building. Surely by now Tina at least has the salary to afford something a little better placed. Even if she hasn’t the funds to procure a truly magical dwelling, then there are certainly abodes where the landlords come from a magical background, something that would save the sisters the concern of discovery by a nosy no-maj. Frowning just a little he makes his way up the staircase, on the lookout for their door.

It’s taken two days to clear his schedule sufficiently to allow for a chance to make this trip, but now he’s here he’s taken time to consider his approach. He’s moving quietly under a veil of silencing charms, alerted to the watchful eye of the no-maj landlady by Ismail, and as he ascends the creaking stairs he goes over again how he’ll smooth things over with Newt. He hadn’t missed the startled reaction from the man when he’d been informed of his jaguar’s true identity, but Percival remains confidant that a few careful words will soothe any ruffled feathers, no matter the unconvinced look Ismail had given him when he’d announced his plan. Newt’s an understanding fellow, Percival knows that for certain.

He’s timed his visit to be well before dinner, just after Tina should have returned home from work, and he’s heard from around the office that Newt spends his evenings with the sisters, so he’s reasonably confident he’ll be in. When Tina opens the door to his knock, her eyes go very wide. In the flurry of activity tracking down Goodfellow, tracing any of his shipments, and generally doing damage control related to his absence and sudden reappearance, Percival hasn’t seen his newest junior team member at all.

“Good evening, Miss Goldstein,” he says pleasantly.

“Mr Graves!” she squeaks, and inwardly Percival sighs. They’d been making such progress the two of them, before this whole ridiculous incident.

“May I come in?”

“Oh! Yes, of course, sir, please.”

She stands aside and Percival makes his way into the strangely familiar little apartment. Without his jaguar senses, the place smells only mildly of incense and baking, but the colours are far more vibrant than his feline eyes could make out. The place is smaller than he recalls it being, and somewhat more run down too. Clean, and neat, but basic.

Queenie is sitting before the fire, her sewing in her lap, but she leaps up at the sight of him, dropping her work onto the seat behind her. She smoothes her skirt nervously, and looks at him with a strange defiance in her eyes. Surprised by the depth of both their reactions, Percival offers them a warm smile. He’s not come to accuse them of any inadequacy, not even Tina. If even one of his own aurors cannot spot him in his animagus form, well, that’s something Percival has already resolved to put right himself.

“I’m sorry to trouble you ladies, I hope I’m not intruding. I came to speak to Newt. Is he around?”

The sisters exchange glances, and then Tina says. “He’s down in his case, sir.”

“Ah, of course. Think you could call him up a moment? I’d like a word in private.”

Though in all honesty, now he’s right here, perhaps coming to the man on his own territory hadn’t been such a hot idea, considering the size of said territory and complete lack of privacy it affords. At least they can go down into the case to discuss matters, he thinks.

“Of course,” Tina says slowly, and then gives her sister a look that Percival can’t read. She moves to the back of the sofa and kneels down to knock sharply on what must be Newt’s case. Queenie steps forward, and says, “Would you like some coffee, Mr Graves?”

“No, thank you, Queenie. I’m hoping to be out of your hair shortly. But thank you, and well, I have to apologise if I caused you any alarm the other day. I didn’t intend to startle you, but I understand my, ah, jaguar form can be a little intimidating if you’re not expecting it.”

She smiles, still uncertain of him, he can tell, and says, “Oh, I understand, Mr Graves. That’s no problem.”

“Oh, and please send my regards to your beau, and my apologies too for disturbing you both.”

There’s a sharp sound from behind the sofa, and Percival’s smile of reassurance falters as he glances around at the noise. “Tina?”  
  
“Oh! Sorry!” She stands up suddenly from behind the sofa, and gives him a flustered smile. “Caught my finger on the latch. Uhm, Newt’s coming. I can hear him on the ladder.”

They wait in slightly uncomfortable silence for a few seconds, and then Percival hears the click of the latches being undone, and Newt emerges into the living room. Percival turns to him with a smile, ready with his best conciliatory expression, and finds that he’s prevented from even meeting the man’s eyes. Newt stands behind the couch, his head inclined, eyes hidden behind his flop of a fringe, and refuses to look at him. Genuinely taken aback, Percival pauses in confusion. This is not the forward and cheerfully energetic man to which he’s grown accustomed. “Mr Scamander?” he asks softly, startled back to formality by this sudden change, “Has something happened?”

That does elicit him a quick look from beneath that veiling fringe: a swift, assessing flash of green eyes hidden again almost as soon as they’re revealed. Newt raises his eyebrows and shakes his head, looking at a point somewhere next to Percival’s feet. “I’m not entirely sure, Mr Graves. Has it?” he replies, the words cut through with a stiffness that’s nothing but unfriendly.

Years of accompanying various incumbent presidents to diplomatic functions have given Graves a solid poker face, even in the most dire of situations, and he employs this now, suddenly uncertain of the welcome he’s getting. “Can I speak to you in private, Newt?” he asks, hoping to move the conversation down into Newt’s case.

“Well, Mr Graves, it’s a little small in here,” Newt replies. “Perhaps we could step out into the hall.”

_Ouch_ , Percival thinks, taken aback by his tone. A sudden realisation hits him. _I’m in trouble with you, aren’t I?_

“Oh, no! Don’t do that!” Tina hurries to say. “We’ll go into the bedroom, won’t we Queenie? There’s no need to go outside, you can talk in here. We’ll uhm, put some music on, won’t we?”  
  
“Oh, sure honey!” Queenie nods along with her sister, and the two of them hurry to the other end of the small apartment, Newt’s baleful gaze following them the whole way, until they pull the wooden dividing doors closed behind them. There’s a moment of uncomfortable silence, during which Percival does his best to reassess Newt’s mood, and the tack he should take in response to it. Upon consideration, this suddenly unfriendly version of the man should perhaps not be entirely unexpected, but the depth of the man’s anger certainly is. This situation may well require a little more rescuing than Percival had previously anticipated.

“What was it you wanted, Mr Graves?” Newt asks, and although his tone is mild, Percival knows him well enough to read between the lines. He glances uncomfortably in the direction of the bedroom doors, well aware that they conceal almost nothing from any persons listening in from the other side, which the sisters most assuredly are.

With a brief flick of a smile at Newt, Percival gestures his sigil for a privacy charm, and the air around them blurs and then fades back to transparency. Now no-one but the two of them will be able to listen in to their conversation, no matter how hard they might strain their ears in the attempt. He sees Newt glance sideways at the effect, his look assessing as he works out the nature of the spell.

“I’m afraid what I have to say is not for general consumption,” Percival says by way of explanation, then pauses for a moment to consider his wording. “I came to thank you for your assistance the last few weeks,” he continues carefully, very aware that Newt is still not meeting his eyes. The man appears to be glaring at a spot somewhere around Percival’s belly, and he gets the distinct feeling that were Newt capable of throwing curses with simply a look, he might already have been hexed several times over. Honestly, Percival isn’t sure what exactly has provoked this sudden and severe change in mannerisms.

“Newt,” he says, suddenly abandoning all his well-rehearsed explanations. “Is everything all right? You seem quite upset about something. Have I come at a bad time?”

For a moment he thinks he’s going to get an honest answer, but then Newt’s mouth presses into a thin line and he shakes his head. When he speaks, his tone is tight, but polite. “No, Mr Graves. Please continue.”

Percival hesitates, at a loss for how to encourage the man to honesty. Clearly something is frustrating him. “All right,” he continues slowly. “I came to thank you for your assistance and ask for your discretion. You stumbled on to an active investigation in the north, and as grateful to you as I am for your help, I must ask you not to speak freely of anything you saw during that time, my...condition included.”

That does earn him a direct look from Newt, brief and piercing. Percival holds his gaze in an attempt to communicate the importance of his words, and after a second Newt looks away again. “Your _secret_ is quite safe with me, Mr Graves. I am more than capable of understanding when not to tattle.”

Again Percival hesitates, unsure of the other man’s tone, and feeling more unwelcome by the second. “Mr Scamander,” he says, more softly, aware that his attitude may have crept towards officious and just a little too aggressive for a person whose reputation hangs on the whims of another man’s discretion. He tries again. “Allow me to apologise for any inconvenience I must have caused you, and I will of course reimburse any expenses incurred for my medical treatment, and, of course, any other resources you might have used up during my stay.”  
  
“That’s quite all right, Mr Graves,” Newt replies. “There’s nothing to repay. You don’t owe me anything.”

“Well, perhaps,” Percival says, beginning to grow a little disheartened. Where is the cheerful, energetic man he’s spent the last two weeks getting to know so well? Surely this isn’t all a result of that foolish invitation of his older brother, is it? The morning after his evening with the whisky bottle Newt had seemed appropriately hungover, but otherwise recovered from his abject misery, at least enough to indicate that the alcohol had rinsed him of the worst of his despair. Now though Percival’s not so sure. Have there been further developments? Should he ask or leave well alone? Newt ought to know that someone understands his anger in all this, and that Percival is quite willing to lend an ear in support of him. More than willing in fact. Flashing Newt a brief, uncomfortable smile, he dips his chin, trying to get a good look at the other man’s face. “Newt, I was wondering...perhaps you might prefer to speak about this somewhere more relaxed?”

“Relaxed?” Newt says, and his confusion is plain enough when he looks up to meet Percival’s eyes. “I’m not sure what you mean?”

_Perfect,_ Percival thinks, feeling the conversation starting to swing back under his control. Warnings about the Goldsteins’ landlady aren’t the only thing he’s picked up from office chatter; that Newt has a tourist’s fascination with New York’s nightlife is another. “Perhaps dinner? Tonight? I understand you’re amenable to such things.”

Newt stares at him, and Percival smiles, lifting one eyebrow. He sees colour rush into Newt’s cheeks, and wonders for a second if he’s only succeeded in embarrassing the man. His fears are confirmed a moment later.

“Are you _mocking_ me, Mr Graves?” Newt asks, voice scarcely more than a breath.

“...no,” Percival shakes his head, uncertain how he might have reached that conclusion. “I was simply-”

“I think you should leave.”

Percival blinks, taken aback. What in Morgana’s name has he said to provoke this response? “Newt, I’m sorry if I’ve-”

“Please, Mr Graves. I would like you to leave now. I won’t say anything about what happened in the forest, or after, but I’d like you to go now.”

It takes him a moment to realise that he’s staring open-mouthed at Newt, who has lifted his eyes from the floor to glare at him with unconcealed anger. Percival is once again surprised by the sheer intensity of that gaze, at the unbending authority the man can muster when he feels sure of himself. He’d heard it in the case once or twice, and each time it had stopped him in his tracks. The sight of it now makes him wither, despite himself, despite twenty years experience in a position of senior authority. He feels like a fool before the weight of Newt’s accusation.

“I’m very sorry to have disturbed you,” he manages, and although the words come out smoothly, he retreats with ignoble haste, unable to muster even a single word further to either defuse the situation or defend himself. The door to the sisters’ apartment is closed firmly behind him, and Percival finds himself once more out on that damp and dingy landing, wondering what on earth just happened. After a moment he straightens his cuffs self-consciously, and with one last glance at the Goldsteins’ door, slinks away in retreat.

 

*

 

Newt closes the door firmly behind the Director and rests his forehead against the wood. His cheeks are burning with embarrassment, and he can feel the unwelcome tremble deep in his limbs that he gets on the rare occasions that something genuinely manages to make him angry.

Percival Graves is just as devastatingly handsome as Newt remembers him being. Of course the last time Newt had encountered the man it had been under somewhat different circumstances, and indeed a totally different identity, which really means he's not met him at _all,_ except as a jaguar, and here Newt pauses his thoughts by way of a gentle thump of his head against the paneling of the door. Merlin's teeth the man had made such a damned fool of him! To stand there, so cool and collected, so confidant, radiating his easy charm while all the things Newt's inadvertently said in the man's unrevealed presence scream themselves over and over in his head. Clearly Director Graves hadn't been making use of his occlumency, or he couldn't have failed to have heard them. Or perhaps his aura of calm is just that _good._

"Oh my god," Newt moans softly.

"Newt, honey?"

It's Queenie, and Newt winces, straightening up and turning away, one hand raking through his tumble of curls. "Uhm, he's gone Queenie. You can come out now."

He can feel Queenie looking at him with concern, and tries to pull the whirl of his thoughts under control. Embarrassment and shame have him firmly in their grip and the last thing he wants is for her to go digging through his head in search of confirmation of what she fears. "He didn't say anything about Jacob," he says hurriedly. "Nothing at all. He just came to say, well, thank you for my helping him. That's it."

"You're sure?" That's Tina. He hears her push the doors further open, and then the soft pad of her feet across the floorboards. "Newt, you're sure?"

"Yes, Tina, I'm quite sure."

They look at one another then, and he can see the strain in her pale face. This whole mess is taking an awful toll on her, and for a second Newt feels a rush of resentment towards the American system of dealing with Muggles.

"Well then," Queenie says suddenly. "I'll put some coffee on for us! And dinner, I'll start dinner!" Her tone of good cheer sounds forced, and Newt knows she's lifted something of his thoughts from his mind regardless of his efforts. He stares at Tina who sits down slowly at the table, her face grim. He's seized by a sudden desire to retreat to the safety of his case, but pushes it down. Running away now would be both cowardly and cruel.

"I really think he came over just to make sure I don't tell anyone about what happened," he says to Tina, and she makes an unhappy face.

"I hope so," she replies. Then she looks up at him intently, her head tilted in something like curiosity. "Newt...did you throw him out?"

Newt, halfway to sitting down next to her, pulls up short in surprise. "Well, I..."

"Oh Newt..."

He frowns, "Tina, he made a complete fool out of me! He was hiding in my case the whole time, and, and- oh Merlin's teeth, the things I said round him, Tina. I said some-, some real _things_..."

Over the last two days Newt has come up with a comprehensive list of the things he remembers saying around Nox- around _Percival Graves_ , including the exact tone in which he said them, and as far as possible the accompanying likelihood that the man had actually been listening at the time. Unfortunately, according to Newt's memory, Mr Graves had appeared to pay him an awful lot of attention throughout the entirety of his stay.

Percival Graves now knows, in no real order, the preferred temperature of Newt's showers (icy on a hot day, almost scalding on a cold), the number of sugars he takes in his tea (one usually, three if it's been a rough night or a long day), how long he spent holed up puking his guts out in Borneo last year (not because he'd caught something out there, but because he'd been stupid enough to eat something that had _definitely_ gone off in his personal food supplies), how torn up Newt remains over his history with Leta (extremely and without any ability to argue that he'd ever felt otherwise), how poorly he gets on with his family (very poorly indeed) and, horrifyingly, how very not straight Newt is and indeed how far in the closet about that he remains. Not so much now though, because Percival Graves knows _everything_ including that.

"Oh my god, Tina. I cuddled him. I _cuddled_ him."

The incredibly handsome, thoroughly dashing Percival Graves. Not usually Newt's type, because as beautiful as the man is, he's so very far out of Newt's league the very idea of even making an overture is entirely laughable. Newt sits down and buries his head in his hands, hazy mental images of sprawling drunkenly beneath the Abiascus tree, an arm wrapped around Nox's neck, face buried in his soft fur-

Tina looks at him sharply. "Well, there's a lot of people wouldn't mind a cuddle of him," she mutters. Then, when Newt looks up at her in startled surprise, she continues more sternly, "Look, Newt. That's not the point."

He stares at her miserably, as Queenie continues to bustle around the kitchen setting the dinner to cooking itself. “I know,” he replies softly. “I’m sorry, Tina, I’m being selfish.”

She leans forward towards him, her hands clasping and twisting nervously between her knees. “I spoke to Ibrahim the day after,” she says. Then at Newt’s confused look, “The Assistant Director? The man that came to collect...Mr Graves...Ibrahim Ismai-, look, he didn’t say anything at all either. So, I think, I don’t know why, but I think Mr Graves didn’t recognise Jacob.”

The sounds of busywork have ceased, although the vegetables still cut themselves and the lard is busy greasing a baking tin. Queenie stands leaning on one of the counters, staring down at its surface. “Teenie,” she says quietly. “I told you, you don’t have to go out of your way about any of this. This is my mess, honey, and I’ll take care of it.”

“ _How,_ Queenie?” Tina asks in exasperation. “What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know!” Queenie exclaims, then, more softly, “I don’t know, Teenie. I just know you don’t need to do any more. I’ll take care of it. It’s not your-, your problem, it’s _mine._ If you do anything else you’ll get into trouble, and I don’t want that. You’ve done enough.”

Newt looks between the two sisters, from Queenie’s pale but determined face, back to Tina’s tense, troubled expression. She has the look of an older sister resigned to the protection of her younger sibling at any cost, and Newt’s seen that look often enough to know it spells nothing but trouble between them. At least, it would between himself and Theseus.

But he doesn’t know what to do. The rules of American magical society are very strict; Rappaport’s Law is, as far as his understanding extends, enforced with utmost exactitude. Tina, as an auror, knows that explicitly.

“I’ll think of something,” Tina says.

Although Queenie smiles in return, the expression is watery and weak, and, filled with a miserable sense of guilt, Newt looks away.  

 

*

 

The Grimalkin smells of tobacco smoke and liquor, its low-lit rooms filled with a companionable buzz of conversation. The private speakeasy is members only, and lies somewhere between a club and a slightly run-down watering hole, its members tending towards the older sections of magical society. Whitewashed walls hung with old tapestries and faded paintings surround a series of small, interconnected rooms, filled with comfortable chairs and small tables, all organised to allow for privacy even amidst the limited space. As an establishment it has no ties to Ilvermorny or to MACUSA, isn’t frequented by aurors, and can call upon no pureblood patrons to fund its costs. All reasons for the Director of Magical Security and his second in command to call the place a favourite.

“I don’t understand,” Percival exclaims, lifting his hands in a gesture of despair. “Why is he acting like this?”

Ibrahim Ismail, settled back comfortably in an overstuffed armchair that’s seen far better days, lowers his tea cup and squints at his companion. “You spied on him, old man,” he says slowly, as though he can’t quite believe the question.

Percival gives him a look of disgust. “Spied on him? Are you-? Mercy Lewis, spying on him was the last thing on my mind. Do you think I got myself torn up just so I could hitch a ride in his case? Check his damned permits? Steal his next manuscript? I was trying to get back home!”

“Well,” Ismail murmurs, and gives a little shrug. “You might have handled it better.”

Percival gives him no reply save for a disbelieving lift of both eyebrows. Ismail sips his tea.

“Do tell,” Percival grits out when it becomes clear his companion will offer no further comment.

“Well, you could have not spied on him.”

“Oh, for the love of-! I was _not_ spying on him, Ibrahim. Do you think I’m a complete idiot? I had no choice, I had to ride along with him in order to get back to the city, and do you think I didn’t try to tell him who I was? I made attempts on several separate occasions to communicate with him!”

“By sleeping in his lap and letting him cry into your fur when he was drunk?” Ismail asks him, head tilted. “Tina told me all about it.” That last is added rather smugly, and Ismail returns to his tea with an expression best described as greatly self-satisfied.

Percival stares at him, blinking at the news. “Did she?” he asks, at first surprised and then immediately suspicious. “That doesn’t sound like Tina. What else did she say?”

Ismail gives him a sly look over the rim of his teacup, then deliberately looks away and into the flicker of the lamp set on the table between them. Percival can feel his old friend closing his mind to him, and he glares in irritation. “ _Ibrahim._ ”

“You are getting demanding in your old age, aren’t you?” Ismail says mildly, then sets down his cup. “You really ought to relax more, Percival.”

“I swear by Morgana…”

“Hmm, perhaps you oughtn’t to, you’ve not had much luck recently, and I expect bothering the shades of the high ones is probably not your brightest idea,” Ismail shakes his head in mock severity, then frowns, his tone becoming more serious. “Now look here, Tina came to me the day after you returned to make sure there wasn’t going to be any trouble. Quite wise of her I thought. But I managed to get it out of her that Newt had reacted rather badly to your _sudden lack of being a jaguar_ , something you might have spotted yourself had you not been so consumed with hurrying us out of her apartment.”

Percival ignores the reprimand with practiced ease, his interest caught by mention of Newt’s behaviour. “And she told you about his reaction to the letter?” he probes.

“No, she didn’t,” Ismail replies with cheerful interest. “I guessed all that, thank you for confirming though. What letter?”

Percival leans back, accustomed to his friend’s games, and rests his elbow on the arm of his chair, fingertips pressed to his lips in thought. “Never you mind,” he mutters.

“Oh come on, Percy. Don’t leave me in suspense!”

Percival shakes his head, curling his fingers and pressing his mouth against them. Perhaps he ought to have taken a moment to think about all this a bit more before he went visiting earlier today. The last two days have been so busy, he’d barely had chance to stop and think at all, let alone consider how Newt might be doing. Maybe, had he thought all this through a little more, he might have been able to head Newt’s reaction off at the pass. Maybe offer his reasons more clearly, explain himself somewhat. Instead he’s apparently left Newt thinking of him as some kind of snoop. _Obviously_ not his intention.

“One thing I did pick up from her terrible fishing attempts though,” Ismail continues, waiting until he has his companion’s attention before continuing. “For all you consummate skill, you are in fact a complete _idiot_ Percival.”

His comment is met with a silent wince, and Ismail raises his eyebrows, not having expected to score a point with quite such ease. In all the years he’s known him, Ismail has found Percival Graves to be a man who walks the line between self-confidence and arrogance with a dancer’s care. A result of his superior magical ability and affluent family background, success for Percival Graves has come far more swiftly and with greater frequency than it does for most. Although not unaware of his advantages, the need to be seen as infallible and entirely in command is a function of his job role, and Ismail has seen his attitude be the downfall of his efforts on more than one occasion. In part, it’s why the man has so very few close friends, and almost no-one that he trusts entirely.

“Why do you care anyway?” Ismail asks, curiously. It’s entirely unlike Percival to become hung up on the reactions of others, and they’ve been more than successful in keeping details of this latest farce from spreading beyond a few people that themselves have only an inkling of exactly what happened. There really is no reason for him to fear bad press from any of this.

Graves simply shakes his head, scowling down into the lamp’s flame with the intensity of someone very definitely hoping not to be questioned any further on a matter. Ismail frowns; he does so love a mystery. “You know, she did mention he’d gotten a little drunk and not to think of that as a habit of his, but I was actually guessing about the crying and the cuddling. Did he really let you sleep in his lap?”

He means it as a joke, a jab to lighten the mood and get Percival scrapping with him again, but the moment he utters the words, he knows. Percival’s eyes have narrowed and his face has gone stiff behind his curled fingers. In the lamplight it’s very hard to tell, but there does seem to be a darkening flush to his cheeks.

“Oh no, Percival. Surely you cannot be-, surely...” Ismail says slowly, and threaded between the words his laughter is low and gleefully appalled. That he receives no immediate and furious denial merely cements his suspicions beyond doubt. “Oh, Percival, you are on your own with this one, my friend!”

Percival glares at him, and the look in his eyes when he sees the delighted amusement on Ismail’s face just makes his companion’s wicked grin stretch even wider.

“Oh shut the hell up, Ibrahim!”

The sudden burst of laughter that erupts from one of the corners in the back makes a few patrons’ heads turn in interest, but seeing the source of the commotion they immediately think better of being caught staring, and quickly and quietly return to their drinks.

 

*

 

It takes two more days before Graves tracks Frederick Goodfellow down. He finds the man in an upmarket speakeasy in an expensive no-maj district, sipping a gin rickey and watching the women dance. Percival slides through the crowd of no-majs, leaving no trace of his passing in their memories, and slips into the seat opposite the petty crook. Goodfellow looks across at him, and his eyes widen in recognition. There’s no-one in the magical community of north america that doesn’t recognise MACUSA’s Director of Magical Security.

“Mr Goodfellow,” Percival says pleasantly. “Once you’ve finished your drink I’d like you to come with me.”

Although his hand begins to tremble, just a little, Freddie Goodfellow, very wisely, does not try to run.  
  
Percival takes his prisoner back to HQ via discreet apparition, and then marches him with a hand around his upper arm through the corridors of the mystical side of the Woolworth Building directly to an interrogation room. He reads the man his rights as they walk, something he hasn’t had opportunity to do for quite some time, and takes great satisfaction in cuffing him to the table before leaving him to stew while he fetches himself some fresh coffee.

Alvarez, working the night shift, sidles up to him in the kitchen, her spoon stirring her coffee even as she sips and makes a sandwich one-handed. “That who I think it is, boss?” she asks, interest sparking in her dark eyes. At Percival’s satisfied nod, she perks up. “Mind if I come watch? I’ll be quiet as a mouse, I promise.”

“I’ll go one better than that, Sofia,” Percival says. “Why don’t you come and second for me?”

Her answering grin shows far too many teeth to be any kind of sweet.

The last two days have been particularly trying for Percival Graves. More so than his ignominious defeat at the hands of a wizard little better than a squib, worse even than his subsequent involuntary imprisonment in his jaguar form, is his embarrassment at his own reaction to Newton Scamander’s thorough rebuffment of his advances. Between burying himself in his hunt for Goodfellow, Percival has spent rather a large amount of his time mulling over the reactions of a man he’d rather foolishly begun to think of as a friend. Friendship is a two-way street, he’d reminded himself, and it might have helped had he considered this before making such an obvious and self-confidant play for the man’s attention. Sometimes Percival forgets that other people don’t see the world quite as he does, particularly in light of his particular skill set.

At first he’d been angry at Newt’s response to him, but Ismail’s laughter had pricked him deeper than he cared to admit, and doubt had begun to creep in through the newly created holes in his armour. Embarrassment had quickly followed, and itself been subsumed by outrage. Considering the situation in which he’d found himself, Percival considers himself to have acted with all due consideration. Unable to speak, unable to write, he’d shelved more complex ideas of communication in favour of simply getting home as quickly as possible. What more could he possibly have been expected to do? Even had Newt been a skilled legilimens there would have been no communicating with him, as confirmed by Queenie’s inability to read him. And yet, here he stands, the monster of the situation, his actions so objectionable that Newt will no longer even look him in the eye.

His tumultuous thoughts had come to a head the previous night, when he’d returned home late, some time close to midnight, having spent the day expending as much of his agitated energy as possible on the tracking of Frederick Goodfellow. He’d sat in his kitchen, beneath the watchful glare of the night-black windows, looked down at his pitiful meal of bread and cheese, and thought _I wish Newt were here._ The man’s chatter could make light of any doleful situation, and the realisation that his mood had been so terrible precisely because he’s at odds with the very source of his yearning had made Percival close his eyes in frustration for a very long moment. When he’d opened them once more it had been to the understanding that he had fallen, and fallen _hard._

Sofia Alvarez, senior auror and long term member of Major Crimes, is an able second to any interrogator. Any crook thinking to take advantage of her due to strange misconceptions regarding her gender has foolishly opted to discount her magical prowess and will of unbent steel. Next to Percival’s polite but icy cold disdain, she offers no hope of succour. While Percival attacks Goodfellow with questions intended to test his story, she shares knowing looks with him, the two of them playing out a pantomime of two aurors who already know everything they need to and are simply passing the time before moving in for the kill. It’s only a little way from the truth. Percival’s testimony alone will allow them to convict, but there’s always room to let a criminal hang themselves by their own fear. If Goodfellow thinks he can win leniency by working with them, something that will readily occur to a coward like him, then he’s far more likely to start letting slip tidbits of information that have so far eluded his pursuers.

“If I were to tell you other things, I wouldn’t necessarily be tied to them, would I?”

Graves pushes down the flare of disgust the man’s wheedling tone provokes in him, and smiles paternally. “I can make you no promises, Mr Goodfellow,” he says softly. “But I can assure you that your cooperation will be noted.”

Noted and dismissed, as far as Percival is concerned, but the man need not know that. Goodfellow looks from the Director’s face to Alvarez’s stony gaze, and then quickly away again. He takes a moment to think, and both of them can see him trying to work out a way to phrase his next words so as to implicate anyone but himself.

“There is...a place,” he starts, eyes darting between the two aurors. “To the west. A farm.”

He pauses, and Percival nods in gentle encouragement. This is starting to sound ominous. As far as they know Goodfellow’s a smuggler of magical artefacts, in itself a crime carrying hefty punishments, but ultimately one that more or less skirts the border of being truly vile and, ultimately, avoids it. If he’s fallen into contact with darker characters however...

“A farm?” Percival asks.

Goodfellow meets his eyes, gaze calculating. “It’s nothing to do with my business,” he says quickly. “But, I know of it. Of the people that run it. And the things they keep there.”

“Go on.”

“Creatures, sir. Beasts.” He looks from Alvarez’s narrow-eyed frown and back to Graves, searching for some indication that either of them are interested. Graves, although he keeps his expression neutral, can feel the first stirring of excitement in his blood. Something about this feels _interesting._

“Magical ones,” Goodfellow finishes.

_There it is_. Something in the back of Graves’ mind clicks smartly into place with the satisfying fulfillment of a puzzle solved, or a fresh and timely opportunity opening up. His subsequent smile is deeply unpleasant and makes Freddie Goodfellow cower in his seat.

“Magical beasts you say?” Graves all but purrs. “Mr Goodfellow, I’m going to need you to give me some more details.”

 

*

 

Somewhere close to fifteen minutes ago, someone had brought Newt a coffee. He’d accepted it out of politeness, and now sits with it cupped in his hands, still untouched and only barely warm any more. The waiting room he’s been left in is as comfortable as it’s possible for such a room to be, clearly intended for victims and visitors on the right side of the law, as opposed to the kind of people that might otherwise find themselves waiting on the Director’s pleasure. Even so it reeks of the accumulated psychic refuse of years of fear and grief and uncertainty, and despite the nicely upholstered chairs Newt is acutely uncomfortable here.

The Woolworth Building had been a riot of people when he’d arrived this morning, a confusing bustle of activity that had set him even further on edge. He has nothing but bad memories of this place, and even with Tina at his side he’d kept his head low and concentrated on not letting his fists clench too obviously. Her own concern had been contagious, and although he’d made an attempt to smile in reassurance at her, the reality is that it had come out closer to a grimace. She’s somewhere else in the building now, getting on with her work supposedly, though he suspects she’ll be doing very little of that at all - Tina, after all, does so like to worry.

She has reason to. The owl that had arrived this morning had asked her to bring Newt along with her to work, and to hand him over to Bennett Silverton’s care - Bennett Silverton being Percival Graves’ personal assistant. Newt has an appointment with the man himself in less than five minutes.

Anxiety is at war with anger in Newt’s head, and he turns the coffee mug restlessly between his fingers. If this is about Jacob then Newt’s going to have to do some very clever and quite audacious political maneuvering to try and dig them all out of the pit they’ve found themselves in. He’s come to realise over the last fifteen minutes that he will, after all, having never in his life ever done so before, have to start throwing out the question _“Do you know who my brother is? Do you?” -_ and just hope to god it buys them some kind of advantage. Because Newt will be damned before he gives up Jacob, or Queenie, or Tina. Of course, there’s also the possibility he may have been called here to answer for his previous rudeness in all but throwing the man out of the sisters’ apartment. Well, if that’s the case, then this time Newt will tell him exactly what he can do with his mocking attitude! See if he’ll stand for having his secrets thrown back in his face, or to be teased for them! No, not at all. It’s been many years since Newt was a child and in that time he’s learned to stand up for himself, thank you very much.

The door opens after a gentle warning knock, and Silverton pokes his greying head inside. “Mr Scamander, Mr Graves will see you now.”

_Will he indeed?_ a small, rebellious part of Newt replies mentally. Instead he gets to his feet and follows the man out of the room, and down a long, echoing corridor. They go only a short distance and then stop before an imposing door, whose golden name plate carries the title _Director_ and nothing more. Silverton knocks twice before opening the door and gesturing Newt inside.

This then is the moment of truth, and Newt feels uncomfortably sick in the pit of his stomach. So far he’s been doing his utmost to focus solely on his anger and not to think of all the horrible things Percival Graves now knows about him. And yet suddenly all that fills his mind is the memory of Nox lying at his side, or sitting next to him, listening to Newt prattle on oblivious to his true nature. Had he been bored? Amused? Disdainful? Will every one of those embarrassing details jump straight into his head the moment he lays eyes on Newt again? Oh, _Merlin._

Taking a deep breath, Newt straightens his shoulders, then pauses to hand the still full mug of cold coffee back to the PA, before heading inside.

Percival Graves is tying a letter to the leg of an owl when Newt enters, and he looks up quickly before raising the bird on his arm and letting it fly free. It lifts itself on a whisper of wings up into highest point of the room, and then vanishes. Newt blinks and frowns, turning his eyes back to the Director only when the man clears his throat.

“Mr Scamander, thank you for coming in today.”

The Director’s tone is low and welcoming, the voice of someone used to speaking to subordinates. Newt risks letting his gaze linger, searching for any indication of the man’s intent. To Newt’s surprise he seems cautious. Reserved perhaps, but excited too. It’s something in the way he’s standing, the way his chin has dipped and he searches Newt’s eyes in an attempt to hold his gaze. It makes Newt want to squirm and although he’s willing himself to meet and hold his gaze in return it’s too much and he ducks his head, looking away. _No threats yet,_ he thinks. _Not yet. Give it time._

“Well,” he says, “I’m here, Mr Graves. What is it you wanted to see me about?”

“Yes, ah. Please, take a seat, Mr Scamander,” the Director indicates one of the seats in front of his desk, and Newt finds himself moving to sit before he can even really process the action. Damn his politeness, he’d really rather stand. The Director waits till he’s settled, then perches himself on the edge of his desk. He’s dressed impeccably as always, his finely tailored suit cut _just so,_ and Newt looks away, down at the floor. This close his scrutiny is unnerving, and Newt dislikes being the subject of such full on attention at the best of times. The man’s charisma is already quite enough to put him on edge, without the memories of the first time he met him rising to the surface. _The first time which of course wasn’t even him. Be fair, Newt,_ he reminds himself. Still though, even if he’s not Grindelwald in disguise, Percival Graves is an exceptionally powerful wizard, and he therefore carries with him a charisma appropriate to his abilities. It doesn’t remotely help that he’s also intimidatingly attractive.

Once more the Director clears his throat, and Newt is certain that he hears the man wet his lips. “Mr Scamander, Newt, if I may?”

It would be churlish and possibly unwise to refuse, so Newt simply nods once, shortly.

“Newt, then. I have a proposal for you. If you’re interested, that is.”

Newt’s mind races; what on earth could he possibly want that Newt can offer? “What kind of a proposal, Mr Graves?” he says slowly, searching for the trap.

“Please, it’s Percival. Just Percival. And of course, let me explain.” He pauses, and Newt hears him draw in a breath. “I’ve come across evidence to suggest that an illegal magical beast farm is being run out of North Dakota, near Fargo - that’s a little under fifteen hundred miles west of here. I intend to shut the place down, and I’d like your help, Newt.”

Newt raises his head in sudden interest, and for the first time looks the Director properly in the eye. “What kind of magical beasts?” he asks intently.

The Director seems encouraged by his response, and he reaches over his desk to pick up a notepad. “Invisible monkeys, which I take to be Demiguises, suspected unicorns, and a number of other creatures the nature of which our informant was not certain, but which we cannot allow to remain in an unsanctioned facility.”

Newt tilts his head. “I didn’t think any breeding facilities were sanctioned over here.”

“Well, not any more,” the Director allows. “And this one is certainly not.”

Newt lets that one slide, time enough to argue that point later. “How many, and how long have they been there?”

“I don’t have that information at this point,” Graves replies. “It’s going to be a case of find out when we get there, which is why I’d like you to come along as advisor and rehabilitator. You have both the facilities and the necessary experience after all.”

He’s watching Newt closely, but Newt doesn’t notice, too busy thinking about what he has available down in his case right now. There’s reasonable space, though he’d need to be careful to keep the Demiguises separate - gentle beasts or no they can be prone to fighting if they’re not from the same family unit. The unicorns could go in the old back left enclosure, though it’s going to depend if it’s a herd...but surely not? Where would they have gotten a herd from?

“We’d be looking to leave very soon,” Graves says after a moment, and Newt looks up at him. This is all moving very fast, and even Newt, always ready to put a beast’s welfare first, knows it.

“I’ll need you to sign them all over to my care and I’d expect full rehabilitation rights with any requisite export permits put in place to facilitate that,” he says tightly.

Director Graves’ answering smile is nothing but accommodating, and Newt realises that for some reason he’s not going to put up anything like the fight Newt had prepared himself to expect. He feels a startling swell of relief that quickly dissolves when he catches himself almost returning the Director’s smile. For a brief moment he’d forgotten entirely the reason for his fear in coming here, but then Queenie’s face, and Jacob’s, and Tina’s appear in his mind’s eye, frightened and worried, and-, he stops his thoughts there.

“Is that, is that everything, Mr Graves?” he asks, almost choking on the words.

The Director cocks his head, the smile fading slightly. “Unless there’s something else?”

Graves’ gaze has suddenly turned inquisitive, and although Newt suspects it’s only a reaction to his question, he doesn’t want to let slip anything unfortunate. Aware all over again of the uncomfortable intensity of this man’s focussed attention, he shakes his head and drops his gaze to the patterning on the desk. This is not why he’d thought he’d been called here, and he feels a brief rush of embarrassment that the man has so easily won him over, despite his outrageous behaviour the other day. He hopes Queenie will forgive him, but if there’s an entire farm of Demiguises out there then it’s certain they’re not being bred to be released back to the wild with their precious coats intact. Deliberately, he hardens his heart, all the while cautioning himself to be wary. Perhaps along the way he might be able to confirm just how much the Director has worked out.

“When do we leave?” he asks.

“You’ll come then?” Graves is as cool as he ever is, but Newt can hear something unmistakably eager in his tone.

He nods. “It would appear so, Mr Graves.”

_“Excellent,”_ the Director smiles, and this time Newt hears his satisfaction for certain. “We leave tonight.”

Newt blinks but then schools his expression away from surprise. It’s unlike a government body to move so quickly in defence of anything other than human beings, but he’s not about to complain. Already he’s drawing up lists of kit he must ensure he has in his stores. “I’ll be bringing my case,” he says absently. “But there’s a few things I could do with having to hand.”

“Make a list,” Graves says, “And give it to Silverton. He’ll find whatever you need.”

“Right, yes, good,” Newt murmurs. “Okay, I need to- I have things to check.” He looks up at the Director to find the man looking back down at him with a strangely triumphant expression, just a little out of place for the situation. He frowns uncertainly, then says,  “I suppose I’ll come back here…?”

“By three pm if you could, please.”

“”Right, three. Wonderful.”

Newt gets to his feet and begins to head for the door. It occurs to him suddenly that perhaps he ought to shake the Director’s hand before he leaves as a show of tentative goodwill or manly acceptance of a plan, but that’s really not his way. He stops, glances back a little awkwardly, then nods when Graves raises his eyebrows in expectant query. “Three pm,” he confirms instead.

Graves nods. “And Newt?” he says.

Newt pauses again, halfway turned away already. “Mr Graves?”

“Thank you.”

Newt hesitates, unable to read the expression on the man’s face and entirely confused by it. Perhaps he’s simply means it as he says it, but then he makes the mistake of locking gazes with the man and all of a sudden he recognises that intense stare. He’s seen it often enough looking up at him from beside his chair, or down at him from where its owner had been sprawled on high. _Yes, be very careful,_ he thinks, and with a final nod, takes his leave.

 

*

 

Only once he’s absolutely certain that the door is securely closed behind his visitor does Percival Graves allow himself a full smile of satisfaction.

_Finally_ things are starting to turn around.

Snapping his notebook closed he pushes himself to his feet, and cheerful in a way he hasn’t been all week, begins to plan the operation.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now we can start smushing the pair of them slowly together, am I right? We can, honest. 
> 
> It's going to be _fiiiine_. 
> 
> ....eventually.
> 
> Have a great weekend, everyone! Thank you for reading!


	8. The Bust

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some things go boom in the night. 
> 
> ...not those things.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry this is a bit late, everyone. I got to Sunday evening and thought, no, this is just _awful_ , so I deleted 2/3rds of the first attempt and rewrote it all. I hope I've come back with something better. I'm certainly more satisfied with it, and I think if you'd seen the meandering mess of its previous incarnation you'd probably agree it needed hacking into a better shape. ;]

They travel via portkey to Minneapolis. Newt grimaces as they rematerialise in a bare, white room, but manages to keep his feet. Portkey travel doesn’t impact him as badly as it does some, but nonetheless it’s still unpleasant. He lets his hand fall away from the plain steel rod of the artefact, and checks his case reflexively. It’s not the the first time he’s brought his luggage via this method of travel, but it still sets him to worrying every time. Around him the rest of the team is setting itself back to rights with shrugged shoulders and massaged necks, even aurors apparently not immune to portkey sickness.

The Minneapolis auror department is headed up by one Captain Rosa Fontaine, and it’s she who greets them at the door to the transport room. Newt thinks she seems polite, but it’s a cool type of courtesy, and he’s no expert but there’s a definite sense of disapproval somewhere in her mannerisms. Newt’s used to that type of thing directed his way, but he can tell by the stilted smiles of the aurors they’ve brought with them that it’s not something they’re going to let pass unremarked on if anyone decides to make something of it. 

Captain Fontaine assigns three of her own people to their group, and then packs them into a pair of nondescript trucks to ferry them to the edge of the city. Sitting in the back of the swaying vehicle Newt keeps his case clenched firmly between his knees, his broom hung with the others on the racks above their heads. The Director is sitting on the bench opposite, to Newt’s left and further towards the front of the truck. He’s sitting with folded arms, his face composed, one leg stretched out slightly before him. He must feel Newt’s attention on him for he looks up, and offers a small lift of the corner of his mouth in acknowledgement. Newt looks quickly away, and in doing so catches the eye of one of the Minneapolis aurors sitting opposite him. The wizard stares openly at this civilian in their midst, and Newt drops his gaze hurriedly to the floor. Next to him, Harris, the youngest member of Major Investigations, offers the Minneapolis auror a broad smile that’s more challenge than friendly acknowledgement. Newt leaves them to it, glad to let them take out whatever grievances they have on each other and leave him be.

The going is slow because the city lies shivering beneath a generous blanketing of snow, but eventually the van draws up to a bumpy halt. They clamber out, brooms in hand: Newt, his case, and nine aurors. In the near distance he can see the very outskirts of the city, the electric lights twinkling in the darkness. In the glow of the vans’ headlights his breath plumes on the air, and the ground underfoot is treacherous with ice. They’re pulled up at the side of a dark road, and in the gloom he can only barely make out the looming shadows of the others. He can hear the Director talking, and squinting makes out his shadow leaning in through the driver-side window of the leading truck. After a moment he withdraws, and Newt hears him slap the driver’s door as he steps back. The trucks start up with a rumble and then both of them slowly pull out, turning a half-circle in the road before heading slowly back the way they came. 

Around him, the aurors are readying their brooms and pulling their coats tight against the bitter cold. Newt pulls his scarf up over his nose, steps carefully to the side and then preps his broom. With a whispered incantation he binds his case to the back, settling it securely for the ride.

“You fly straight with that thing tied on there?”

Newt looks up at a bulky shadow, face lost to the darkness.  _ Harris _ , he thinks. “Uhm, yes. Yes, it’s fine.”

“Huh. Should get yourself some saddlebags. Be easier.”

“Hm, yes, thank you. I’ll bear that in mind.” He  _ has  _ saddlebags of course, like any travelling wizard, but Harris has been set as his watchdog and Newt understands when someone’s trying to be friendly even if it’s not entirely welcome. 

“All right, gather round.” Director Graves is just another shadow in the darkness, but nonetheless the group turns to him as one, drawing in around him. “We have five hours to Fargo, we’ll stop once. Huang’s leading the flight, take direction from her.  _ Pay attention. _ We have a civilian flying with us, be aware of him. Keep him in the middle and help him stay on course. Mr Scamander, if you need anything Harris is your immediate point of contact, but any auror here can assist you. Understood? Good. Everyone? Right, let’s get in the air.”

The flight to Fargo is bitterly cold. Even with his coat and flying trousers lined with heating charms, the cold nips in around Newt’s ankles and wrists, and makes his cheeks ache with it.  _ Should have packed as I did for Siberia _ , he thinks as they race through the darkness. Still, they make good time. The aurors fly at a punishing pace, and although Newt’s no slouch on a broom, he’s acutely aware that the group is flying to match his speed rather than the other way round. In his youth, simply handling a broom round a quidditch pitch had never been his forte, and he gets the impression that these men and women are more than competent in their flying, far more so than the average witch or wizard.

Even with a brief rest stop somewhere close to halfway, they make the outskirts of Fargo by one in the morning. The city is quiet at this time, and when they dismount Newt can hear the low rush of water somewhere close by. There’s a building up ahead with lights still on, surrounded by low wooden fences. Newt can hear cows in the vicinity and thinks this must be the farm house they’re staying in - the Director had spoken of it in his briefing before they’d left New York. Run by magical folk, it’s a staging point for any auror operations moving west.  

Newt’s actually shivering by the time someone comes back from the main building to fetch them all, and the warmth of the inside hits him like the opening of an oven door. He looks around at an old-fashioned, plain house, and three women who usher the team inside and close the door behind them. There are a pair of brown spaniels hanging around the kitchen, eyes shining with excitement at the visitors, and these are soon herded off to another part of the house out of the way. As the aurors unwrap themselves, dripping melted snow from their overcoats onto the floor, the women set out food and drink. There’s a bustle of activity and it’s clear from the way they interact with the farmers that the three local aurors have been here before. Newt, case back in hand, lets himself be directed to a place at a large kitchen table where he sits until food is laid before him.

“Everything well, Mr Scamander?”

The Director pulls out a chair next to him and seats himself without invitation, a mug of something steaming in his hand. Newt puts down his spoon, stew forgotten, and unconsciously shifts his case a little further out of sight under his chair. 

“Yes, good, thank you.” He eyes the Director sideways. The man looks nothing like he’s just flown over two hundred miles in the cold and dark, barely a hair out of place. Newt resists the urge to run his hand through his own unruly fringe, knowing he must look flushed and red from the cold ride and the sudden heat of the kitchen.

“Excellent.” 

The Director sits, sipping his drink, seemingly content just to share space with him, and gives no indication that he’s intending to move anywhere. Newt glances around for Harris, eager for the first time for his chaperone’s presence. Unable to locate the man, Newt turns his attention back to his stew, and reluctantly begins to eat. 

“I’m going to head out in a short while with a couple of the others to scout ahead,” Director Graves says suddenly. He leans in closer than Newt would prefer, voice pitched low. “I’d like you to remain here for now, until we know what we’re up against. Still I’d like your advice. Is there anything in particular we should be looking out for?”

Newt considers this, turning his spoon between his fingers. “Well,” he says, angling his head away a little to escape the intensity of the man’s gaze. “I imagine they’ve taken some measures to conceal themselves from prying eyes, so I doubt you’ll see much from the outside. You might listen for any strange noises, but really it depends on what they’re keeping.” He pauses, then glances sideways at the Director. “I suppose you might have some success sniffing the place out. After all, you are uniquely qualified to do just that.”

If Percival Graves hears any of the acid in his tone, he gives no indication of it. Instead he nods, and gives Newt that strange half-smile he seems to favour so much; a quick, wry twist of his lips and a dip of his chin. “I’ll see what I can do.” Then he drains his mug and sets it down on the table. “We’ll be back by morning, try and get some rest.”

Newt watches him leave from beneath his fringe, frowning as he singles out a seated auror with a hand on their shoulder, before drawing them along with him to the adjoining room. He has an easy, confidant way about him that quickly draws people in and gains their co-operation, even when they might not necessarily even consider him an ally. It’s something in the way he holds himself, the way he pays attention to the people he’s talking to. The way he  _ looks. _ Newt sighs in annoyance, and goes back to his stew, mood turned suddenly sour. 

“All right there, Newt?”

It takes a real effort of will not to tut when Harris sits down next to him, bowl of stew in hand. Newt offers him a thin smile instead, and thinks  _ couldn’t have been here five minutes ago, could you? _

Harris grins, applies an overly generous helping of salt from the shaker to his stew, and tucks in.

  
  


*

 

 

As soon as his paws hit the snow he hears it. 

Percival crouches, alarm making his hackles stand on end and raising his lips in a snarl. A rhythmic rush of sound that fills his ears and then, as soon as it appeared, is gone. Listening, he hears nothing but the soft sigh of the wind across the snowy grasslands, and the gentle ripple of some long-forgotten fabric hanging torn from a fence post. For a moment he’d thought-, but no. He listens again, and still hears nothing. Shamefully, he’s allowing some residual anxiety from the curse to play tricks on him. 

He lifts his nose to the frigid night air, and sniffs. Carried on the light breeze he can smell-, he can smell  _ salt and water,  _ he can smell the ocean. He growls low in his throat, flexing his claws in consternation, and shakes his head. When he tastes the air again he gets nothing but snow and the far distant tang of engine oil. 

For aurors, travelling light and fast, the beast farm is just under an hour’s flight from their base on the outskirts of Fargo. They’d landed some distance out from the buildings, stashing their brooms in a small grove of straggly trees near to the dirt track that leads to the place. The sky had cleared over the course of their flight, leaving the heavens bright with stars, and lending enough light that even his human form aurors could pick their way in the gloom. Percival had sent them both, one of his own and one of the locals, to circle out around across the fields and come at the place from the far side. Once they were both out of sight he’d transformed to take a different look.

The snow here is not as deep as it had been in the forest, but it’s fresher and the going is a little awkward. He scrambles up and over one of the fences, feeling it shudder beneath his weight, and finds himself going deeper into a drift on the other side than he’d expected. Huffing snow out of his nose, he scrambles free and looks around. His eyesight in the dark is far superior to that of his human form, and by the light of the stars he can see the blur of farm buildings in the distance. There looks to be one main, rectangular dwelling, and a row of two large barns alongside. He can smell dogs even from here, and sure enough after a moment there’s movement from between the buildings and an animal stirs. The clink of its chain is loud in the otherwise quiet night. 

Circling around, Percival tries to catch the wind, hoping to taste the scent of what’s in the barns. There’s a sweetness on the air, like something he can’t quite place. Not unpleasant at all, though it’s hard to categorise the scent as anything but strangely agreeable. He licks at his nose, unsure if he’s catching something real or imagined.  _ Or magical perhaps, _ he thinks, as he continues his wide circuit of the place. 

Eventually he gets close enough that he can smell the barns with ease. The breeze carries to him the pungent scent of animal dung overwhelming most every other scent, and it smells of something he’s not quite familiar with. Cows he knows, horses too. This is something else. And that there, that’s Demiguise, he knows that one from his brief sojourn down in Newt’s case. He can’t tell precisely how many, but he estimates more than three. As for the other scent, all he can say is herbivore. 

They spend two hours at the place in the end, and by the time they meet back up at the grove of trees the sky has already clouded over again and the first flakes of snow are starting to fall. Standing with his shoulder leaning against one tree trunk, Percival waits for the other two to arrive back and wonders if they’ll get enough snow to cover their tracks.

“Three people,” Huang says when they’re both returned. She has a knack for conjuring small spirits that can be used to spy, and has spent the last two hours sending them to explore as much of the place as she can reach. “An older guy in the farmhouse, with two younger. One is definitely his son, not sure about the other one. Couldn’t get into the barn, it’s warded and I didn’t want to set the dogs off.”

“I counted five mutts,” Atkins supplies, and she nods in agreement. 

“Fine,” Percival says. “That’s enough for tonight. Let’s get back.”

They fly back ahead of the oncoming snowfall, racing an ever-darkening sky. Face buried in the folds of his scarf, Percival can yet smell the ocean, and frowning he wonders if he’s coming down with something. 

When they get back, Newt is already up. The gathered snow clouds have made dawn late, the sky still darker than it ought to be even at this hour. Newt sits at the kitchen table, the farmhouse dogs around his feet, and looks up when the three of them enter. The women are already out in the barns tending to their cattle, and Newt sits with the remnants of a breakfast plate before him, a mug of tea in his hands. Huang and Atkins excuse themselves immediately, turning down his offers of breakfast, but Percival sits down at the table gratefully, glad for a moment alone with him.

After a moment’s hesitation, Newt brews coffee, and sets more bread to toasting, before frying up eggs and bacon. He’s clearly already endeared himself enough to the farmer and her daughters that he has free rein of the place, and Percival sits back, content to let him work. It surprises him that Newt’s not immediately chasing details of their target and he looks at him closely as he tends the skillet. Newt wears his sleeves rolled up, customary white shirt a little crumpled, and Percival thinks he’s already taken care of his own beasts by now if he’s allowed himself to come out here for breakfast. He watches as the man applies lard and turns the bacon, and the sudden thought occurs to him that a week ago he might have expected a taste of this as a reward for sitting quietly. Embarrassed by the thought, he buries his nose in his coffee and hopes the flush across his cheeks isn’t too obvious. Normally it takes a lot more than that to make Percival Graves blush.

“Breakfast,” Newt says, setting a plate and a small rack of toast down in front of him. He takes a seat at the opposite side of the table as Percival tucks in, glad of the diversion. He’s still sitting silently by the time Percival finishes, wiping at his mouth with his handkerchief. Newt’s gaze lies somewhere on the table, and he seems grim and watchful.

Percival tucks his handkerchief back in his pocket and clears his throat. “Thank you, I needed that.”

Newt makes a small sound of acknowledgement, and Percival feels his heart fall a little. They may have reached an ability to co-exist with professional politeness, but clearly there’s still a long way to go yet. Newt is obviously not waiting here to ask after his health, and he realises now what this silent attendance is in aid of. Well, Percival thinks. I can at least give him that. 

He sits back in his chair, running a hand through his hair and says, “I can’t be sure what they’re keeping as they were all secured out of sight, but I caught the scent of Demiguises, at least three I believe. They have a group of medium-sized herbivores too. I’ve never encountered a unicorn before so I can’t confirm the scent, but it would fit with the information our informant passed to us.”

Newt’s gaze is intent, and he nods.

“I didn’t smell blood or any other kind of-” he almost says ‘decay’ then stops himself. Newt’s done his share of travelling and tending to trafficked beasts, so he must know the realities of the black market, but something holds Percival in check. “-ah, injury. But of course I didn’t get line of sight to them.”

Newt clears his throat and straightens in his chair. He wets his lips, looks up at Percival and then immediately away again, and Percival knows what’s keeping him so quiet. “I can’t let you take part in the raid proper,” he says, watching Newt’s face stiffen. “You must understand that I’m responsible for the safety of everyone on this team, including you. However, there’s a place down the road close by I’d like you to wait. I need you far enough away for safety reasons but close enough you can attend as necessary. Is that all right?”

For a second it seems like Newt is fighting with himself over how to reply, but then he swallows and says, “I would need to be close enough to attend immediately, Mr Graves.”

Percival looks at the man who opposed Grindelwald, and saved MACUSA from tipping the scales to all-out war. At Newt who places kisses on the noses of giant Runespoors and calls them Sydney, and who rubs the little feet of Mooncalves better when they knock against a rock. He can, he is entirely certain, take care of himself. 

“You will be,” he promises.

 

  
  
*

  
  


Afterwards, Newt will be unable to say exactly what made him look up when he did. He’ll say, in the report they make him write, that he was standing in a copse of trees half a mile down the road from the farm, slowly freezing to death and being a dutiful, law-abiding civilian consultant. He’ll add that up until that point he was completely concealed from sight by both the cover of the trees and the darkness of the overcast night. Furthermore, he’ll say, he was, right up until then, doing everything his auror chaperone had asked him to do.  _ But _ , and here he will ask for their professional understanding, when the time came for him to act, he could not in all good conscience, as either a civilian or a trained magizoologist, simply stand by and watch.

It’s three minutes after the noise of the raid has died down, all the unnecessary shouting and breaking down of doors that so typifies every MACUSA raid Newt’s read about or indeed had the misfortune of being present for, having settled back to some semblance of order. The night, so recently filled with shouting and the hollering of the dogs, is once again quiet. Harris, standing at Newt’s side, is staring intently into the distance where they can see the silhouettes of the aurors moving around inside the farmhouse, back-lit by the light from within. Newt knows full well that the man would much rather be over there than playing babysitter over here, but he is, unfortunately, a consummate professional and has thus far resisted any of Newt’s attempts to tempt him to take them both closer.  

Newt is just formulating another angle of attack when something, he really cannot say what, makes him look back towards the farm. He turns in time to see the night light up with an enormous billow of blue and pink flame that fills one of the barns and nearly takes its roof off. The resulting thunderous clap of explosive sound reaches them half a second later, accompanied by the shrill, fizzling shriek of an out of control magical reaction dreaded by every alchemist everywhere. 

“That was a potions lab,” Newt gasps, straightening from his instinctive crouch.

_ “Was,” _ Harris acknowledges.

Shouting erupts from the dying echoes of the explosion, but after the brightness of the flames it’s difficult to see what’s going on. All of a sudden, from out of the space between the two barns there’s a rush of movement. Three equines stampede from the darkness, wheeling away from the still-burning barn and out towards the open fields. From the silvery glow of their hides and the grace with which they move, Newt knows exactly what these beasts are. Immediately he’s out from beneath Harris’ grasp and away, even as the auror curses and reaches for him, hand closing only on air.

“Scamander!” Newt hears him shout from behind, but by that point he’s already astride his broom and in the air.

The darkness whips by as Newt heads in swift pursuit of the unicorns, following their blind rush by the glow of their magic, and then, when he’s closer, by the thudding of their hooves through the snow. Despite the depth of the drifts they leap and bound with the grace inherent to their species, and a part of Newt is relieved to see it for it suggests that they’re not as badly hurt as he feared they might be.

He can see another person on a broom heading across from the left, the small flying lamp on the front of the handle shining red in the darkness, and grudgingly Newt reaches forward and switches his own to life - it will do no-one, including the unicorns, any good if he ends up in a collision out here before he can recapture the beasts. A few seconds later and Harris comes up on his right.

“How are we doing this?” he calls across, and Newt, relieved, thinks,  _ maybe he’s not so bad after all. _

“Stay wide of me, I’m going to push them back round towards the farmhouse, I’ll try and calm them down. Who’s that coming up on the left?”

“The Director by the look of it.”

_ Of course it is, _ Newt thinks, and putting his head down, speeds off to the right, swinging round the outside of the charging herd in an attempt to encourage them back towards the light. Percival Graves comes out of the darkness and is beside him in seconds, long coat snapping in the wind. 

“Newt, push them over to the west of the farmhouse, we’ll corral them there!”

Even working together it takes them longer than Newt wants to get the three unicorns safely within a shield set up by two of the aurors on the ground. Once they’re confirmed safely contained, the Director is immediately away again to check that the fire in the first barn is under control. Newt’s torn between following him and tending to the beasts wheeling and stamping in fear behind the shielding. Compromising, he grabs the sleeve of one of the women on the ground, saying to her, “Listen, I need you to keep them calm. They like witches, so just try and soothe them a bit - but don’t get under their hooves! They’re very mild mannered usually, but they’re scared right now. I’ll be right back!”

Despite the containment shields and the damping spells in action, the chemical smoke rising from the burning barn fills the air with thick, cloying smoke. One of the aurors is calling up the wind, trying to direct the smoke away from buildings, relying on the shielding to prevent his efforts from fanning the flames higher. Newt finds Percival in the flickering shadows near the barns, his wand directed at the flames as he drains the air from within the shields that contain them. Magical fire doesn’t always need air to burn though, and the violet flames are stubbornly resistant to his efforts. Newt grasps his shoulder to get his attention, one arm over his nose and mouth to keep out the worst of the smoke. He coughs when he tries to speak, but the Director looks back over his shoulder at him.

“They came from the other barn,” he says, over the snap and roar of the flames. “Harris, go-, no damn it, I’ll go with him. Take over here.”

Harris picks up the Director’s spell, lending his efforts to containing the blaze, and Graves grabs hold of Newt’s upper arm, running with him towards the second barn. The doors stand open, one half knocked off its hinges, and there’s the faint glow of a lumos spell from within. “Okafor’s in there, looking for anything else. Be careful, the other barn had defenses, they set their own fucking distillery off with the ones on there.”

Newt barely hears him, head swimming from the effects of the smoke coming from the fire. Whatever they were brewing in there the smoke it gives off has quite a kick. He’s starting to see strange colours at the edges of his vision, and he shakes his head. “What-?” he grimaces.

“Are you all right?” Graves asks, leaning in close. He doesn’t look entirely healthy himself, his pupils blown larger than they ought to be.

Newt nods and pushes inside the barn, the Director’s hand still around his arm, in support or caution it’s not clear. Inside the barn is filled with a bright silver light from a hanging lumos globe, and by its unforgiving glare they can see a group of empty cages gathered near the door. Okafor is moving around the back of the barn and he calls out to them, “They are not empty, they are invisible! I think I have them all now.”

Newt kneels down by the cages, and it’s only long experience of Dougal that lets him feel the presence of the Demiguises within. Each cage is small, shaped like a domed birdcage, and giving barely enough room for the animal inside to fit, let alone move around. Scowling, Newt makes soothing noises to the inhabitants, and then moves off further into the barn. Mostly it’s stalls, well kept and clean, and he passes between these until he finds the auror at the back. The man is going through a pile of cages, poking a long stick he’s found inside each one before moving on to the next. He’s not being rough about it, but still Newt frowns at the sight. Percival looks around, sleeve over his mouth against the building haze of smoke. 

“Let’s be quick about this,” he says.

Together they join Okafor and begin digging through the rest of the cages.

  
  
  


*

  
  


In the end Newt brings three Unicorns, five Demiguises, eight Mokes and a Puffskein that the traffickers had hidden in the house into his care. Percival helps as best he can to get the beasts down into Newt’s case, though his time is mostly taken up in helping his aurors to contain and conceal the magical fire that continues to burn throughout the night. If there’d been anything other than the distillery hidden in that first barn then it’s no longer in any way alive. 

As far as Percival can tell, the whole situation has been caused by stupidity. He’s come across illegal potions labs like this before, but most people have the sense to give them the level of ventilation they require to stop them from being accidents waiting to happen. This group had rigged the place with flash-bang alarms, not even magical, to warn them if anyone tried to get in, and as soon as one of his team had opened the barn door and set one off, the spark had ignited the gathered vapours and the whole place had gone up. They are incredibly lucky that no-one had been badly injured. 

With the fire finally under control Percival sends the prisoners back to Fargo via apparition. Huang, most familiar with the area, takes them, along with another of the local aurors, their intention to hit Fargo and carry straight on to Minneapolis via secure vehicle. A little bit of prior politicking has led to Percival agreeing to leave the prisoners in the hands of the local aurors, on the understanding that he’ll take care of the beasts, and they’ll share any further information they attain with New York. Of course, the act of stepping on jurisdictional toes is somewhat overshadowed by the fact that the Director had to come out here personally to clean up a serious breach of the Statute going on right under the noses of Minneapolis’ finest. That he was the one with the trained magizoologist to hand, and therefore the one best placed to attend, is of course simply lucky.

Newt’s case has been placed in a corner of the traffickers’ kitchen, and Percival, wiping the sweat and smoke out of his eyes considers knocking on the lid, then disregards the idea as foolish. If Newt does as he expects, he’ll have put the unicorns at the very back of the case in the large empty habitat on the left, and will thus be well out of earshot. Instead he simply lifts the lid and climbs down the ladder.

It’s a totally different experience going down into the case as a human. The ladder feels steeper for one thing. Indeed, without his jaguar form’s excellent climbing skills, Percival feels just a little wobbly on the way down. This time he can feel a ward on the exit that he manages to pass through after a moment’s thought, and which he resets once he reaches the floor. Strangely, the inside of Newt’s shed feels surprisingly welcoming to him, and he looks around with a half-smile, breathing in the familiar, if now somewhat muted scent of all the various potions ingredients around the place. He doesn’t linger, feeling for the first time despite himself, a little like an intruder.

His predictions turn out to be wrong. Newt is in the yard in front of his shed, surrounded by open cages. He’s already looking up at the doorway when Percival pokes his head out, and he raises one eyebrow. His arm appears to be slung beneath something, although nothing can be seen, and in his other hand there’s a pipette of liquid. 

“Mr Graves,” Newt says evenly.

“Ah, I thought you’d be out of earshot at the back,” Percival says, suddenly feeling very much like an ill-mannered trespasser. 

After a moment, Newt sighs and shifts what Percival concludes must be a Demiguise to a more comfortable position in his arms. “No, I left the lid unlocked in case any of you needed me.” 

“Actually,” Percival says, slowly descending the steps to the yard. “I came down to see if you needed any help. The fire’s out, and I’ve set the team to doing clean up. How are the beasts?”

“If you could stay over there please,” Newt says by way of reply. “The Demiguises are still very nervous and I don’t want to cause them any further stress.”

Percival nods obligingly and takes a step back. Newt isn’t looking at him any more, and Percival hadn’t missed the coolness to his tone. After spending so much time with what he’s come to think of as ‘the real Newt’, this new version is beginning to unnerve him somewhat. It’s as though the man he’d come to know never even existed, replaced by this cold, withdrawn version that will barely even look him in the eye. 

“All right,” Newt says softly. “You settle on here, and I’ll be back in a minute. Dougal, if you could?”

Percival hadn’t even seen the other Demiguise, his eyes only registering it when it finally moves to jump up on the table next to Newt. It puts its long arms carefully around something and draws it in close. 

“Okay, Mr Graves.” Newt turns half his attention to his visitor, the other half still focussed on tidying his feeding equipment. “The beasts are doing well, they’re mostly frightened from the fire. For all that their farm was illegal, they weren’t being mistreated as such, although the Demiguises were being kept in shockingly small cages, no doubt to ensure they could be retrieved with ease.” There’s a noise from a small enclosure off to the side and Newt takes a few quick steps over to it, calling inside, “All right, you four, settle down, I know it’s all very exciting but I need to treat your brother before I can come and make your home a bit nicer.”

Percival cranes his head to see into the habitat, but all he can glimpse from this angle is a shiver of small trees as they rattle beneath the movement of their invisible inhabitants.

“I need to make more space for them, I wasn’t expecting five,” Newt says. “The Mokes will need somewhere more permanent, although they’re fine in the box they came in for now. And the Puffskein’s a puff, you know what they’re like.” Percival doesn’t actually. His father had despised the very thought of even such neutral beasts and forbidden his sons to own one, even though they lived in a remote rural zone with somewhat less stringent licensing laws. “And the unicorns are in the paddock, though really they could do with a wood, I just didn’t know how many there would be and I didn’t want to risk reducing their space too much.”

“I can handle that for you, if you like?” Percival offers. In truth he’s exhausted, but there’s clearly still work to be done here, and he finds himself experiencing a certain satisfaction from being back down in the case, one that renders him at once unnerved by its depth and yet strangely unwilling to do anything that might cut short his visit. He stows that thought away to be considered later. “I can cast tree growth charms if you give me a few of the saplings from the nursery.”

Newt looks at him sharply, eyes narrowed, then seems to think better of whatever he was going to say. “Yes, well. I suppose you do know your way around here, after all,” he remarks, and something in his tone makes Percival want to wince. He smiles instead, offering his most pleasant expression, while on the inside he’s beginning to think he might have miscalculated. Ismail, damn him, appears to have been right. The man really has taken full offence to his inadvertent presence the previous week.  

“Perhaps you could show me where?” he says diplomatically. 

With an unconvinced hum _ ,  _ Newt nonetheless sets down his dosing kit, brushes off his trousers and leads the way to the nursery, Percival following meek as a Mooncalf a few paces behind. 

  
  


*

  
  


If the situation had been any different, had he an apprentice or an assistant for example, Newt would never have allowed Percival Graves unsupervised access to the interior of his case. As it is however, he can already hear the new troupe of Demiguises fussing in their habitat, nervous and still suffering the aftereffects of smoke inhalation. As fast as that auror had been working, they’d still ended up sitting in the smoke for longer than they ought to have. Having left the Director with a set of ten little saplings to coax into full growth, certain that his presence isn’t disturbing the unicorns too greatly, he returns to his Demiguises and busies himself with expanding their habitat and making them all comfortable. 

By the time he’s as finished as he can be with them, he’s moved on to mixing up some feed for the Mokes who require a very specific diet to properly flourish. It doesn’t take long before he notices that one of them is fat with eggs which necessitates a quick setup of a proper nesting box for her, and he’s so busy with this that he doesn’t at first notice that Percival Graves has returned. He sets the nesting box in place next to the shed and when he looks up he finds the man watching him from near the foot of Frank’s old enclosure. 

“What’s wrong?” Newt asks in concern.

“Nothing,” the Director says, shaking his head. “I’ve finished the habitat, if you’ve a moment to look.”

Blinking in surprise, Newt checks his pocket watch. “Right, yes, I suppose that all took longer than I thought.” He looks back at Graves who’s still watching him with that odd, cautious expression. “Well, lead on then.”

Where previously the unicorns’ enclosure had been a large, grassy paddock, now it’s a fenced off wood, lush and deep with emerald shadows, its bounds stretching off into the far distance. The saplings are full grown, and the enclosure has been expanded with a mixture of extension charms and deft illusions, making the little wood he’d envisioned expand into a full-blown forest. Newt peers between the thick trunks, and says, a little taken aback, “How big did you make it?”

Percival glances at him in concern, then steps along the fence, drawing Newt’s attention with a tap of his hand to where the canvas starts. “I expanded the initial habitat threefold, I thought that would give them a bit more space to roam, but other than that it’s simply charmwork on the canvas to keep the sense of depth going. I put some very minor turnaround cantrips around the edges so they don’t run into the fence of course. Is it enough?”

Newt clears his throat and lifts his wand, testing the strength of the cantrips. “It’s good,” he says weakly. “Plenty. Very good, I-, well. Uhm, yes. Well done.”

The Director smiles at him, and Newt’s not sure what to make of the relief in that expression. He’s not used to having someone else work in his case or do anything near the level of setup the man has completed in such a short amount of time. Everything else in here he’s designed himself, so of course it’s all to his exact specifications and restricted entirely by what his magic can achieve. Having someone else, someone quite frankly far more skilled than he is, do any kind of work down here feels distinctly odd. He looks back at the man, at a loss for words. 

“Hallooooo in there!”

The shout comes from the direction of his shed, and the Director frowns, smile vanishing.

“Was that Harris?” Newt asks, and he nods.

They find the auror still at the top of the ladder, leaning down into the case, hands braced around the lip of the opening. “There you are,” he says cheerfully. “We’ve got some feed up here if you want it?”

“Isn’t that evidence?” Newt asks doubtfully. 

The Director shrugs. “It’s all been recorded, and the courts will have my oath-bound word for its quantity, that will be enough.”

Newt eyes him sideways. “Of course it will,” he says drily. Still, he could make use of the extra supplies, and if Percival Graves is willing to exert a little of his overwhelming influence to make things go Newt’s way then having the Authorities go out of  _ their  _ way to help him is such a rarity this side of the globe that he’s unwilling to turn him down. 

In the end a couple of the aurors help float the sacks down, and although they do their best to keep their eyes to themselves Newt can see them drinking their surroundings in with eager curiosity. It puts him on edge to have so many strangers down here in his case, but the Director seems just as unwilling as he is to allow them any freedom of movement, directing his aurors with stern commands where to stack the surplus and shooing them back into the shed as soon as they’ve delivered a load. Newt, seeing that Graves is keeping his men firmly in hand, leaves him to take control of things in the yard, then brings out his ladder and starts storing it all in the shed’s roof space. 

It doesn’t take too long to get everything down from above, then the two aurors are thanked curtly for their help by the Director, and sent firmly on their way. Newt listens to him send them packing with a confused sense sort of amusement. A second later there’s a footstep below. Graves stands at the bottom of the ladder looking up at him, and asks quietly, “There’s a couple of crates of Mooncalf pellets too, do you want them up there?”

Newt shakes his head grimly, the question as to what might have been in the other barn now answered, and directs him to set them with the rest beneath his workbench. 

With the extra feed stored and the ladder once more stowed, Newt finds Graves sitting on the steps to the shed, elbows on his knees, watching the Emperor dung beetles at their work. He looks exhausted, covered in a fine layer of greenish soot, his normally perfect hair ruffled and out of place. Newt’s never seen him look so human before, and it makes his steps falter as he rounds the corner. The Director hears him and looks up, then begins to push himself to his feet.

“No, don’t, it’s fine,” Newt says hurriedly. “Ah, just, uhm.”

Graves hesitates too, and for a moment they just look at each other uncertainly. Then Newt coughs and steps past him, up into the shed where he has a flask waiting. He opens it and puts a hand over the end to check the temperature. “Did you get any of this?” he asks. “I gave a flask to Harris to hand round. It’s uhm, a cleanser. For the smoke. To drink?”

“Ah,” Graves shakes his head. “No, I didn’t have chance.”

“Well, you ought to have, Mr Graves,” Newt says, quietly disapproving. “You can’t expect to be helping others if you’re half out of your head on fumes.”

He stops short, embarrassed by his tone, but Graves is looking at him with a rueful smile. “I suppose I could do with a drop. My head feels stuffed with wool.”

“Hm,” Newt replies. “I’ll warm it back up. It tastes worse cold.”

He busies himself with reheating the concoction, the same one he’d used for all the beasts he’d brought in, its efficacy more than enough for human maladies too. The Director sits himself back down on the steps to the shed, and as he waits for the potion to reheat Newt takes occasional glances at his back. Graves has left his coat and armour somewhere, and his expenive white shirt is dusty. Only he would put such a fine garment on beneath his enchanted body armour for fieldwork, and Newt shakes his head. The man is quite ridiculous. Fine-looking though, in his long flying coat and combat armour beneath, every inch the American wizarding hero.

“Oh stop it,” Newt mutters to himself, angrily.

When he hands the Director the steaming mug of tonic he does so perhaps a little more roughly than is warranted, and he gets a curious look for his trouble. Frowning, Newt goes down past him into the yard and looks around at the mess of empty cages. He can feel Graves watching him, and he keeps his back to him, the warmth in his cheeks only serving to make him more frustrated with himself. So, the man’s good looking. That hardly excuses his previous behaviour.  _ And excellent at spelling up habitats too, _ some traitorous part of him supplies. Furthermore he’d invited Newt along on this raid of his when he really didn’t have to. Even if it’s nothing but an attempt to ingratiate himself to Newt in order to make use of his contacts then, well, at least some good has come out of it regardless. 

“Will the beasts all recover?” the Director asks suddenly, and Newt turns to face him.

He rubs his nose with the back of his hand to distract from his still warm cheeks, and says, “Yes, eventually.”

Graves hums thoughtfully, nodding slowly. He’s watching Newt with an expression Newt can’t quite read, something somewhere between curiosity and, what - hope? Anticipation? No, Newt can’t quite work it out. He squints at the man, and Graves crooks an immediate smile in return.  _ What do you want from me?  _ Newt wonders exasperatedly. 

“Newt,” says Graves, setting down his mug. He pauses, draws in a breath, then tilts his head at Newt as though deciding whether he should continue or not. “I know this probably isn’t the best time, we’re both tired and busy, but-,” 

Newt is staring at him intently, his suspicions growing as to what he’s going to say. Newt’s had a great deal of pressure over the years from various authorities to reveal his sources, the locations of his beasts, and the names of breeders. Many of them have tried bribes before, and he supposes this whole rescue has been just another type of sweetener. 

“-well, I thought that now we’ve both had some time to cool off, get ourselves back to normal, you might, I don’t know, consider coming out to the club with me?”

Newt stares at him. Graves clears his throat and picks up his mug, tossing the last droplets out into the dirt. He lets it swing between his fingers, that same half-smile still on his lips. He looks entirely relaxed, but in a sudden flash of insight Newt realises he’s seeing the man at his most awkward. Deliberately offhand, entirely happy for his idea to be turned down, obviously his pride can take it really - no, no, really. This is what awkwardness looks like on a man so fluently charismatic as Percival Graves. It’s something in the way the warmth of his smile has more than a hint of sharp anticipation when he meets Newt’s eyes, as though despite his outward appearance of calm he’s holding his breath waiting on Newt’s response. 

To Newt’s eyes he looks entirely like a man trying to work out if he’s been rumbled for some crime he’s committed. 

_ You’re worried I’m going to say something publicly about your jaguar form. You’re really, truly worried I’m going to out you, aren’t you?  _ Newt thinks wonderingly.  _ That’s  _ what this is about. The very idea of it is preposterous of course. Newt’s not the sort to reveal another person’s secrets against their will, and besides, he’s more than aware that this man could make his life truly hellish if he were to try anything of the sort. 

“I’ll take that as a no then,” Graves says softly, when he receives no immediate reply. “I understand.”

Newt blinks, not sure quite what to say. The Director is shaking out his mug again, pushing himself to his feet and dusting off his trousers. “Thank you for the tonic,” he says, holding up the mug. “I feel a lot better already.”

“Uhm, you’re...welcome?” Newt replies. Again, Graves gives him that crooked half-smile, his demeanour once more the powerful, confidant wizard, and for a second Newt doubts his reading of the situation. But then Graves turns, and placing the mug on the inside table makes to ascend the ladder and leave. It feels abrupt even to Newt, but he has no idea how to handle this man. “Director!”

Graves turns with raised eyebrow, and there’s something hopeful there that freezes Newt’s tongue. He doesn’t know what to do with it, with a situation where a man as powerful as this has become so horribly entangled in his private life. “I’ll, er, have the report written up. And sent to you. Tomorrow probably.”

At Graves’ blank look, he adds, “On the beasts. And I’ll come in for the permits this week.”

The Director draws in a breath and nods curtly. “We’ll be flying back this evening. I expect you’ll want to remain down here with your beasts, so I’ll have someone carry your case back. I’ll have Harris come and let you know when we’re due to depart.” 

He does leave then, going up the ladder without looking back once. Newt stares after him, feeling as though he’s just made some kind of dreadful mistake, but not sure what he could possibly have done to handle the situation better. Something, obviously. People have never been his forte, and certainly not people as fancy and charismatic as Percival Graves.

“Bugger,” he whispers. 

  
  


*

 

 

The Major Investigations forensics labs are quiet at this hour, and the gentle bubbling of brewing potions is the only sound in the stillness. Outside New York has settled into mid-evening, its socialites just about leaving their early dinners ready for a night of dancing despite the snow that still gathers on the sidewalks. Inside the labs it’s warm and lit by the glow of fashionably modern electric lights. 

“What exactly do I have to do, Ibrahim?”

Percival Graves sits on a lab stool, legs crossed, leaning back against one of the benches with his fingers pressed to his forehead. It’s the evening after their return from Fargo, and the day has been filled with paperwork and reports, and fending off the scrutiny of Madame Picquery whose interest in his little side-mission was especially piqued by the rumour of some kind of magical “explosion.” He’d had a fine old time explaining that one to her, and no matter that he’d covered every base her disapproval still rankles. 

Ibrahim Ismail, crumbling dried leaves into a beaker, looks up at him and frowns. “You really like this Scamander chap, don’t you?”

“Yes, I’ve made that clear. Let’s not go over this again,” Percival replies, rubbing at his throbbing head. Maybe it’s a lingering effect of smoke inhalation, or perhaps it’s simply the fact that he’s forced to do so many people’s thinking for them, but his head had started to protest some time around mid-afternoon and it’s not let up yet.

Ismail sighs and laughs softly as he mixes ingredients, the stirring rod making a sharp clinking on the glass that has Percival wincing. “Then I ask you yet again, do you know why he’s angry?”

They haven’t spoken of this particular topic since that evening in the Grimalkin, but Percival’s been mulling it over ever since, and ignoring with magnificent disdain the comments his friend has been so liberally dropping the past few days. “He thinks I deliberately deceived him,” he replies quietly. 

“And have you apologised?”

“Morgana’s tits, Ibrahim! For what?” Percival holds out his hand in frustration. “I was hardly spying on him, I was trapped! Cursed, as I’m sure you remember. What was I supposed to do? And don’t say ‘not spy on him,’ that’s bollocks and you know it.”

Ismail snorts lightly, unimpressed by the outburst but amused by the choice of words. “Yes,” he replies. “Keep that up, he’ll at least understand you when you’re cursing at him.”

Percival hisses frustration through his teeth, and sits back. “I’ve been exposed to you for too damned long,” he mutters.

“You do seem to have a thing for the English.”

“Don’t start. Look, I don’t know what else to do. I do understand how he might feel as though I invaded his privacy, I’m not a fool, you know.” Percival waves a dismissive hand, and Ibrahim looks up at him from beneath raised eyebrows, declining to comment. “But I can’t make it right if he won’t talk to me. I just don’t know how to get him to open up again. I thought perhaps if I gave him something to be pleased about we might have some common ground, other than what happened. We could have, oh, I don’t damned well know.  _ Talked, _ I suppose.”

“How very mature of you,” Ismail murmurs. He pours the glooping contents of his beaker into the silver cauldron on the bench and begins to stir slowly. 

“I don’t know what he wants from me, Ibe, but I’m not going to give up on this. I understand if he’s not interested in anything more, but I’d at least like to explain my position. Clear the air. But he just won’t give me an opening! What is he expecting me to do? Go down on my knees to apologise?” For all that he’s willing to accept he might not have handled all this quite as perfectly as he’d at first thought, the very idea of being the only one expected to apologise makes Percival’s pride smart. He’s done enough damned apologising the last year for all his and his department’s monumental fuck-ups and everything they’d subsequently led to. To grovel for his mistakes in personal matters as well is simply too much.

“Hm,” Ismail hums thoughtfully. “Lots of things you can do from your knees.”

For a brief second Percival looks startled. “Ibrahim!” he exclaims, as the man in question continues to carefully pipette several drops of a gleaming silver liquid into his cauldron. Ibrahim simply lifts an eyebrow in response as he concentrates. Percival glares at him, eyes narrowed, then asks slyly. “...would that work, do you think?”

Ismail’s guffaw of laughter turns into a sharp howl as the movement causes more drops than he’d intended to splatter into his mixture. “Oh bloody hell, that was too much!” he declares as the cauldron’s contents start to bubble madly. “Aaaah...damn it!”

_ Serves you right, _ Percival thinks, and with a sniff, picks up his coat and makes a swift and graceful exit before the inevitable explosion.

  
  


*   
  


 

Later, walking home, he pauses to look out over Central Park, at the bare branches and the blanketing cover of snow. It’s beautiful, but it leaves him cold both inside and out. Too much like the bitter, life-draining ice of the northern forests, the memory of his near-miss still too close for comfort. So easily he might have bled out in that forest, quite likely never to be found again, his bones the only thing left once the scavengers were done with him. The sheer luck of Scamander finding him out there had been extraordinary. No, whatever happens, he at least owes the man for that.

Tucking his chin into his scarf, Percival apparates the rest of the way home, moody and grim, for once out of ideas.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter is end of part 2! (Of 3.) I'm dying to write it and see what you all make of it. :3
> 
> Thank you, as ever, for your support - you're all keeping me on my toes and ensuring this gets done! 
> 
> For interest's sake, I imagine the Minneapolis aurors would have run their offices out of [City Hall](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Minneapolis#/media/File:Minneapolis_City_Hall_circa_1900.jpg).


	9. Dinner at 8, maybe?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tina has a plan, Newt is tongue-tied, and dinner may be on after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter requires a warning for painfully stilted conversations between two tragically awkward people. You have been warned.

 

Tina is sitting at the dining table when Newt emerges for the evening meal. There’s a pot of something steaming on the stove, and the meaty aroma tells him that it’s the leftover stew from the night before. Queenie is nowhere in sight, and Newt surmises that she’s out on her own again, or more likely, out with Jacob. He wanders over to the stove and gives the pot a stir, glancing at Tina as he passes. She sits, a teetering stack of books next to her, deeply engrossed in the pages of a thick, leather bound volume.

“Good book?” Newt asks.

Blinking in surprise, Tina looks up at him. “Oh-, Newt!” 

She closes the book, marking her place with her hand and looks past him to the pot. “That’s almost ready. If it’s bubbling we can eat it.”

“I’ll dish it out then,” he smiles. As he does so he tilts his head sideways to read the titles on the spines of her precarious stack of reading material.  _ Tales of the Animagi,  _ one of them declares.  _ Meredith Bryon’s Guide to the Moon Ritual and Tips for Success, _ another. Newt purses his lips but doesn’t say anything, pushing a full bowl of stew across to her before taking a place opposite. Tina has resumed her reading, one hand keeping the book flat while the other holds her spoon hovering in place above her bowl. With a glance at her, Newt sets to eating and for a few minutes there’s silence.

Suddenly, Tina draws in a sharp breath. “I think there’s a chance Mr Graves might not have noticed Jacob,” she says, the spoon now clenched determinedly upright in her fist, not unlike a weapon. Newt swallows, then looks carefully across at her from behind the dubious shelter of his fringe. She stares back at him, determination a fearsome glint in her eye.

The moment he’d returned from Fargo the sisters had, quite reasonably, jumped him for an assessment of the Director’s intentions regarding their mutual muggle friend. Newt, despite being thoroughly exhausted, had nonetheless given them as clear a description of the current state of affairs as he’d been able, i.e. that Graves hadn’t once mentioned, implied or alluded to any knowledge of the man’s true nature, and as such remains either blissfully unaware of him, or is otherwise biding his time. Unsurprisingly this had satisfied neither sister. 

“What makes you say that?” he asks neutrally.

Tina leans forward. “It says in here that animagi have a ‘ _ peculiar perspective _ ’ on the world, that they don’t see it in the same way as we do. But, from what I’ve been reading, I think what it really means is that when they’re in their animal form they somehow don’t make sense of the world in the same way as they do when they’re in their human form.”

Newt frowns, stirring his stew slowly to help it cool. “What does that mean precisely?”

Tina sighs in frustration, shaking her head. “I don’t know, it’s not clear. It’s like all these books were written for people who already know all the answers. This one, believe it or not, was the simplest one I could get. Do you know how hard it is to find anything that’s not either written as bedtime stories for children, or some musty old door stop filled up with pages and pages of numerological analysis of when to do the ritual? I mean, look at this one! Endless pages of numbers tables and seasonal star charts, not a thing about what to expect after you’ve actually succeeded! Do people honestly go into this whole thing completely blind? Who on earth does something like that!” 

Newt eyes her teetering pile of books, and reaches over to tear a chunk of bread off the loaf. “Is that a romance novel?” he asks, squinting at one done up in black leather, the title  _ Bound By The Wolf Lord _ printed in silver lettering along its spine. Tina covers it quickly with one of the other books before he can do more than glimpse the front picture, and pulls the stack towards herself. Nonetheless he’s certain he catches sight of more pink silk than he’d ever before associated with animagi. At least he thinks it was pink silk.

“I thought there might be something useful in there,” Tina mutters defensively.

“Ah, good thinking,” Newt nods, doing an awful job of hiding his smile when she scowls at him. 

“This is serious,” she snaps. “What if he picks up on Jacob’s scent?”

Newt shrugs. “When is he ever going to do that, Tina? It’s not like he goes wandering around the streets of New York as a jaguar, is it? I don’t think even he could get away with that.”

Closing up her book, Tina sighs heavily and stacks it with the rest. “I’ve read before that animagi can be a bit  _ peculiar _ ,” she says. “But you never quite know what to believe. They’re so rare.”

Newt shrugs again. “There was one in my year at Hogwarts. Turned into a rabbit.”

“And?” Tina demands.

He looks briefly confused.

“What were they  _ like _ , Newt?”

“Oh, she was, well, she was twelve years old, I think we were all a bit peculiar back then.”

Tina gives him an exasperated look, and snatches up her spoon. Watching her attack her stew with far more gusto than perhaps necessary, Newt decides to leave it at that. It’s not that he doesn’t understand her need to do something, just that she’s working herself up over something that hasn’t actually happened yet. In all fairness, he can hardly talk, then again at the same time there are some things you just can’t do a lot about. 

“Well,” Tina growls around a mouthful of dinner, “No-one can accuse Mr Graves of being _ ‘peculiar’ _ .”

“Oh, I don’t know about that,” Newt mutters, and she looks at him sharply. Immediately he feels his cheeks starting to pink and somewhat abruptly turns his attention back to eating. 

“... _ Newt _ .”

Sitting back in exasperation, knowing full well that tone means she won’t rest until she gets an answer, Newt lets his spoon rest for a second and stares out of the window. Anything rather than meet the hopeful interest in her eyes. He knows full well that she’s clutching at straws and scrabbling at useless details in her attempts to find some way out of Queenie’s mess, but he finds that he can’t blame her for it. If only they were back in England then none of this would even matter. 

“Well, he has a very strange sense of humour, and I’m not sure he fully understands the concept of personal space,” he says, as evenly as he can. 

Newt winces when Tina blinks at his reply. He perhaps ought to have phrased that a little better, with somewhat less innuendo, but damn it, it gets the point across. She’s not the one who’d ended up cuddling him all night in a drunken stupor. Merlin, just the thought of it still makes him flush red with embarrassment. 

“I’ve never noticed that,” she says slowly. “Well. I mean, he can be very, I don’t know.  _ Tactile  _ I suppose? Not in a bad way, he’s always a perfect gentleman, but, I suppose now you mention it, he does do that... _ thing _ where he stands next to you, and you just have to, pay attention I guess…” 

For a moment Tina seems lost in thought, or perhaps in memory, and almost surprised by her words, Newt nods eagerly. It’s something of a relief to find that someone else has noticed the Director’s strange habit of simply  _ hanging around _ . “He does lean in very close as well, doesn’t he?”

“Well, sometimes I suppose,” Tina says hesitantly.

It would make a great deal more sense if other people had noticed the Director’s strangeness, Newt thinks, and especially if they’ve done so and come up with ways of dealing with it. “Does he ask you out to dinner too?”

_ "What?!” _

Newt leans back, surprised by the sharpness of her exclamation. “Oh. Right. No then.”

“Newt,  _ what?”  _ Tina has let her spoon drop to the table, and Newt realises he’s made a tactical error. “When did he do that?”

Flustered, Newt begins digging through what’s left of the contents of his bowl, but Tina won’t be put off. “Mercy Lewis, Newt! Really _ , _ when did he ask you to dinner?”

He can feel his cheeks getting hotter, the tips of his ears joining in for good measure. That really had been a stupid thing to say, and now she’s not going to let up about it. “I think he was just joking,” he mutters and stuffs a spoonful of potatoes into his mouth as an excuse not to say anything more.

“No, I don’t think Mr Graves would joke about something like that. Are you sure you heard him right? Did he mean a working lunch, or, or a formal dinner of some kind?”

Newt considers this.  _ Had _ he meant a working lunch? No, of course not. He’d wanted to talk - about secrets probably. He makes an unconvinced sound and says reluctantly, “Actually, I think he’s probably just worried I’m going to tell everyone about his jaguar form.”

He can see Tina thinking about this, working through her knowledge of the man and weighing it up against what she’s just heard. He leaves her to it; she’s far better at understanding people than he is. 

“You don’t think he wanted to talk about Jacob at all?” she asks eventually, still clearly not quite believing she’d heard him right.

Newt represses a sigh, and stops himself from scowling at her. He may find people difficult, but he’s certain he’d pick up on the man trying to wheedle information like that out of him. “No, Tina,” he replies gently. “If I’d thought that I would have told you at once.”

Silence falls, and Newt takes the opportunity to finish off his dinner, while Tina stares, lost in thought, at the pot still steaming on the stove.

“Maybe you should go.”

Newt chokes on a mouthful of carrot. “What? Are you-, are you serious? I’m not, I mean, I can’t just go out to dinner with him, Tina!” He stares at her aghast, stunned by her betrayal. She returns his look with that calculating light to her eyes which means she has a plan. Not a bloody chance, Newt thinks, and says with some triumph, “And I’ve already told him no, so it’s simply impossible!” 

Her expression hardens into one of determination, and Newt, embarrassingly, immediately feels himself start to wilt beneath it. 

“Think of it as a reconnaissance mission, then,” she says. “For the sake of your beasts. If Mr Graves thinks you’ve been helping Queenie see Jacob he’ll have you tried as an accessory to a breach of the law, and then what will happen? Who’s going to look after Sydney, and Pickett, and Clara if you’re locked up in a cell?”

“Oh, Tina, that’s a low blow,” Newt breathes, amazed and a little impressed by her capacity for such hard-hearted action. 

Her expression softens a little. “Just try and talk to him, Newt. You have a chance to find out what he knows! Maybe he only wanted to put his side of the story across away from everyone. I mean, Mr Graves, he’s really a very private person.”

“Is he?” Newt says flatly. “He seems to have no qualms about invading other people’s privacy.”

She meets his bitterness with a thin-lipped and grim smile. “I know,” she replies simply. “But maybe you should tell him that.”

“I think a gentleman would already know.”

“Maybe.” Tina seems strangely doubtful, and Newt raises his eyebrows in offended disbelief. “Or maybe he’s just too proud to admit it. Men like him don’t apologise, Newt. Not really. It’s a power thing. All part of the games the big boys and girls play.”

Doesn’t Newt just know it. He’s met arrogance like that plenty of times during his life, and butted up against it far too often during his career. He’d wanted to think that maybe MACUSA’s Director of Security might be a better man, a more righteous man, but then again...whatever level you find them at, people are just people, with all their flaws. 

“Or maybe,” she says, “It was all part of this supposed animagus ‘oddness’. We won’t know unless you try and find out.”

Reluctantly, Newt sighs and closes his eyes. Maybe he had overreacted the first time Graves had come round to talk to him. He supposes he had cut him off quite sharply, but then again the man had deserved it! That joke about his amenability to ‘such things’, if it even  _ had  _ been a joke. And now, meeting Tina’s gaze across the table,  Newt’s not so sure. Maybe he hadn’t been referring to Newt’s preferences. What if the dinner offer had been entirely innocent and Newt had simply misinterpreted it? What if the man really did just want to talk? Merlin, maybe even to apologise? No, he wouldn’t do that - would he? Damn it, he just doesn’t know!

“Fine,” he breathes. “Fine, I’ll think of-, of  _ something. _ ”

“Thank you, Newt,” Tina says, and reaches over the table to grip his hand and give it a squeeze. 

_ I’m going to regret this, _ Newt thinks.

  
  


*

  
  


They start with coffee. Not even official coffee. Just coffee, because Americans like coffee, don’t they? 

Newt writes up his report on the bust, and of course it takes him longer than he’d said it would to get it done. He’s not much one for official paperwork at the best of times, and he knows that, so he’s not sure what had moved him to make the outrageous suggestion that he’d get it in on the day after the raid itself. Madness. Regardless, it’s three days before he makes his way to the MACUSA offices, gaining access to the upper levels by hiding in Tina’s shadow. At least this time she’s not dragging him along by the upper arm.

She leaves him in the aurors’ little canteen area as she goes off to scout out Graves’ PA, on the understanding that without an appointment, Newt’s best chance of actually getting to see the Director in person is if his watchdog isn’t around. And so it’s while he’s lurking in the little side-area that Newt first gets the idea. 

The aurors have some kind of arcane device set up to one side that hisses every few minutes, giving off the deceptively pleasant aroma of brewing coffee, and as his eyes alight on it, Newt thinks  _ typical Americans.  _ And then he thinks about it a bit more and idea of having something to hold to give his hands something to do while he’s in there, or just something that will help him start a conversation might not be such a bad idea after all. It takes him a good few minutes to work out how to activate the thing, and when he does it’s a mad scramble to get the coffee mug in the right place before it spews coffee all over the floor. But he manages, and by the time he hears Tina leading Silverton away towards her desk, he’s ready to make a quick dash out into the corridor and from there to the Director's office.

The corridor is empty and longer than Newt remembers it being. His heart rate has increased far above what the short walk should merit, and as he walks he sorts nervously through the openers he’d been planning all last night. Most of them sound awkward even to his ears, and unfortunately the very idea of engaging in friendly conversation with the Director, now there’s no immediate and pressing need for them to communicate, makes Newt thoroughly miserable. He’s not one for small talk, and all the things he’s actually interested in are almost guaranteed to make other people acquire that shifty, uncomfortable look they so often wear in his presence. The thought of having to fight on through seeing that horrible look on the Director’s face almost makes his steps falter, but he hardens his resolve and presses on. This is necessary. He was the one that brought this trouble into the Goldsteins’ house, therefore it’s up to him to help resolve it.

The door to the Director’s office looms large before him, and Newt pauses to draw in a steadying breath. He’s come too far now to slink away in defeat. What on earth would Tina say? He’s just reaching up to knock on the Director’s door, when suddenly the wood falls away beneath his knuckles. The door opens and that tall, middle eastern auror from his first night back in New York appears in the gap. Newt, having subsequently almost knocked on the man’s chest, takes a startled step backwards, almost slopping hot coffee all over himself. Surprised, the auror looks from Newt’s face, to the coffee, then glances back over his shoulder.

“You have a visitor, Percival,” he says, then steps out and to the side, holding the door for Newt to go through. He looks far too amused for Newt’s liking. “Go right in, Mr Scamander. The Director is free and  _ entirely  _ at your disposal right now.”

Newt edges carefully past the man and his somewhat off-putting smile, and finds himself inside the Director’s office for the second time in a week. Percival Graves is looking up from his desk, surprised at the sight of his visitor. He rises quickly to his feet, the surprise sliding into concerned confusion, and Newt hears the door click quietly closed behind him. 

“Newt?” Mr Graves asks cautiously.

“I brought you coffee,” Newt says, and holds out the mug. 

Unsurprisingly, his first attempt at an overture doesn’t succeed in quite the way he’d hoped. Percival Graves, apparently torn between mystification at his sudden appearance, and a poorly concealed enthusiasm that Newt instinctively doesn’t trust, immediately offers him a seat, sliding into the easy small talk of the consummate professional. Newt’s trip over, the weather outside, the bustle of the streets are all enquired after and the information almost immediately dismissed in its irrelevancy, before they finally, mercifully, get to the point. Newt hands over his completed report, drawing the somewhat crumpled paper from his jacket and wincing when he spots someone’s muddy pawprints across the back of it. 

Apparently oblivious to both the pawprints and Newt’s unease, or at least politely ignoring both, Graves insists on taking him through it immediately, making additions here and there as he clarifies certain points, and initialling the changes with one of those modern self-inking pens. Newt watches him in silence, taking the chance to examine the man’s face while his attention is fixed elsewhere. He looks fully recovered from the ill-effects of the raid, the dusting of soot long gone, his hair once more finely styled, and although his jacket is off and his sleeves are rolled up over his forearms in an unusually casual manner for him, his vest is neatly in place and every other aspect of the man is fitted, combed and presented to perfection. Newt represses a sigh. Some people are just  _ good _ at such things. He, personally, is not one of them.

The Director is writing his notes in a neat hand, finishing each line with a confidant flourish, although Newt can’t tell precisely what he’s scribbling from here. When he lets his eyes wander from the man’s hands back up to his face, he realises with a jolt that he’s being watched. Graves lifts his eyebrows at him in query, and Newt wonders with a pang of embarrassment what he’d done to draw his attention. He hadn’t intended to sigh aloud, and he’s almost sure he hadn’t, so perhaps the man is-...he better  _ not _ be reading me, Newt thinks crossly, and scowls. Graves flicks him an uncertain smile, and Newt realises he’s letting paranoia get the better of him. Probably.

“Do you have the second section to hand?” Graves asks, after a moment. 

Of course he doesn’t. Sections 2A, 2B and 3 all come on their own separate pages, and Newt can actually visualise, now he thinks about it, exactly where he’d left them, forgotten and not even remotely filled out. He just hopes no-one’s made off with them as nesting materials by now. Graves, to his credit, is entirely understanding, and even though Newt’s ears are burning, he seems more than willing to turn a blind eye to his embarrassment.

In some respects it’s a good thing. A small amount of embarrassment suffered for a chance to make a second attempt at striking up innocent conversation with the man. This first go has thus far not been any kind of success, all the smooth openers and calculatedly benign points of small talk had taken wing and flown from Newt’s mind the moment his backside had hit the seat. Instead he’s sat in uncomfortable silence, listening to the tap of Graves’ pen and feeling bizarrely like an intruder.  

As Graves thanks him for the coffee, Newt makes a valiant attempt at a charming smile, and feels something inside him die at the look of concern it seems to elicit instead. Dropping his gaze behind the protection of his fringe, he hopes the heat he can feel rising in his cheeks isn’t as blazingly apparent as it feels. Nonetheless, he manages to make his retreat with a promise to return the next day with the rest of the filled-out paperwork, and, desperate to escape, scurries off down the corridor leaving a puzzled and most likely thoroughly unimpressed Director behind. That idea is only compounded when a last glance back over his shoulder from the end of the corridor reveals the sight of that other damned auror slipping back into the Director’s office and closing the door quietly behind him.

_ Ibramail or something, _ Newt thinks.  _ Bastard. _

No doubt the pair of them will be having a jolly good laugh at his expense, and, disgusted with humanity and with himself, Newt makes his way back through the bullpen, not even stopping to say goodbye to Tina. 

  
  


*

  
  


The next week is a lesson in endurance for Newt. Three times he returns to visit Percival Graves, and each time the man near sweeps the paperwork off his desk to make way for whatever Newt’s brought him. His attentiveness and amenability are, quite frankly, unnerving.

The first time Newt returns it’s with the remaining sections of the original report. As before, Graves has him sit while he goes through the pages, initialing here and there, asking for the occasional point of clarification. Newt obliges him, but turns down the coffee the man offers causing an expression of quiet triumph to flit across the Director’s features, the origin of which Newt doesn’t fully understand. He sits instead with a glass of water, fiddling with the rim and wiping his thumb across its curve to make patterns in the condensation. 

If Percival Graves is using any powers of legilimency to lift the thoughts from Newt’s mind, then he’s either hiding his reactions well, or he’s playing the long game. Newt’s not entirely sure which it would be, and by the end of that return visit he’s certain the man can’t be as skilled a legilimens as he’d first feared. Had that been the case then he’d have quite easily picked up on the debilitating awkwardness Newt feels the moment he steps into the man’s presence. It’s as though every drop of social competence he possesses vanishes immediately before the harsh reality of the Director’s attention. 

It irks Newt on a fundamental level that the man can so thoroughly reduce him to a tongue-tied bag of nerves simply by existing in the same room. He’s supposed to be striking up a conversation, turning it carefully towards talk of what Graves might have seen all those days ago, and subtly working out just how much trouble the Goldsteins are in. Instead he finds himself sitting in uncomfortable silence, answering too quickly whenever Graves queries something, and trying not to squirm in his chair whenever the auror’s piercing gaze lingers too long on him. 

The trouble is, Newt has nothing to  _ say _ to the man. He has no reason to ask about his animagus abilities, at least not one that won’t lead inevitably to hackles being raised on both sides, and the moment he gets into his office all he can see are the trappings of rank and political power that surround the man - all things that freeze Newt’s tongue up as surely as a silencing spell. Making friends with a man like Percival Graves is the very last thing Newt wants to attempt, even for such an important cause.

And so the second attempt ends in failure too. This time when he leaves he deliberately avoids Tina’s desk, going as far as to take the long way round the bull pen to avoid running in to her.

The second and third times he comes back it’s about the permits. Tina’s impatience with him has already stung Newt into irritability, so he’s not in the best of moods when arrives up in the top offices to find Percival Graves already on his way out. Graves, seeing him back again, steps aside from the group of aurors he’s leading towards the escalator and comes over to check on him. The heat of the scowl that Newt gives him when he discovers the promised permits are still being worked on would have made a salamander start to smoke, and even Graves seems to hesitate at the depth of anger he’s seeing in Newt’s expression. 

“You promised, Mr Graves,” Newt says to him, frightened by the speed at which he can sense his rightful guardianship of the beasts slipping away into the mists of MACUSA bureaucracy. 

Something in the Director’s expression shifts at Newt’s words, the apologetic half-smile fading to be replaced by an expression of somber acknowledgement. “I did, and I apologise, Newt. Come back in two days, I’ll have them for you personally.”

It’s only later, when he’s down in his case doing the evening routine that Newt thinks maybe he ought to have reined in his anger a little better. He’d not missed the looks on the other aurors’ faces during their brief exchange, and as professional as the Major Investigations team is, ears had most certainly pricked up the moment he’d allowed his tone to turn sharp. He’d left in a hurry, having slunk over to Tina’s desk, found her in the company of  _ Harris  _ of all people, and hastily made his excuses to leave. Nonetheless, he’s back in two days time, ready to hold the Director to his word. 

Graves does not disappoint. When Newt is shown into the Director’s office for the fourth time, he already has the permits laid out on his desk ready for signing. He regards Newt with that same intent scrutiny that he has every other time he’s been here, as though waiting in anticipation of something. Newt sorts through the permits, and, finding them all to his satisfaction, shuffles them into a neat stack. This then, is his last chance. After this, there’s no reason for him to return.  _ Think, Newt! _ he says to himself.  _ Say something interesting! _

The silence stretches, and the only thing Newt can think of to say is ‘thank you’. Hardly enough to draw the man into revealing his secrets.

“Have you made any plans to return to England?” Graves asks suddenly, and Newt looks up. 

“I, well, not yet,” he says, relieved beyond words to be handed an opening. “I don’t really have much else to do now, though my VISA doesn’t expire until the end of next month.”

“Will you travel?” Graves laces his fingers on the edge of the desk and leans back in his chair. Newt blinks at him. Questions such as this are seldom uttered without some underlying motivation, and he’s learnt long ago to be conservative with the details.

“I don’t really, I mean, no I don’t know really. I don’t have anywhere to be, and well, obviously I have more important concerns now with the new acquisitions. They’ll need tending and I’d rather not take the liner back and risk exposure. I mean, I’ll need to be down in my case most of the time, and I don’t want to provoke suspicion if I’m never around. On the other hand I can’t keep an entire troupe of Demiguises down there for long, they really do need more space than I can provide for them. As you, well, anyway. As you know.” Aware that he’s begun to babble, Newt risks a look up at the Director, who immediately looks away, straightening the pens that lie next to his blotter. The gesture surprises Newt, who’s unused to someone else being the first to break eye contact. “Why?” he asks curiously.

“I simply wondered.” Graves gives him a polite smile, relacing his fingers, but even Newt can sense that he’s lying. Or misdirecting perhaps. 

“I have no plans to take on or search out any more creatures, if that’s what you’re asking,” Newt says carefully.

“Mr Scamander, what you get up to in your free time while in America is entirely your business, as long as your actions remain within the bounds of the law,” the Director replies, and gives him a stiff smile. 

Somehow Newt doesn’t think he’s being chastised. Despite the wording, that whole spiel had sounded far too rote to be a genuine admonishment. “Right,” he says doubtfully, and tries to read the other man’s expression. It’s difficult, because the Director’s got such a good poker face - all polite charm, you’d never know what he was thinking until too late. Percival Graves may sometimes say a lot with his eyes, but what he chooses to say is only that which he wishes a person to see. Newt’s met men like him before, and he knows not to let himself be fooled.

They stare at one another, Newt still desperately trying to work out how to carry such a stilted conversation in the direction he needs it to go, Graves still regarding him with an expression that’s borderline uncomfortable. 

“I’ll be in New York,” Newt offers, and is surprised when Graves nods with an almost inappropriate amount of enthusiasm, apparently relieved to keep the conversation going. 

“Will you? Then perhaps, ah you ought to take in a show. They’re mostly no-maj, but some of them can be quite charming,” he says.

_ What? _ thinks Newt, who has absolutely no interest in shows of any kind. He gives Graves a blank look, and the Director clears his throat, straightening in his chair. He looks uncomfortable, an expression Newt’s used to seeing on the faces of people trapped in a room with him, but not one he’s used to seeing on the normally collected Percival Graves. 

“Has something happened, Mr Graves?” he asks, for a moment forgetting his dislike of the man. 

Graves’ eyebrows rise and he goes still. “Not that I’m aware of?” he says slowly. “Why? Is something the matter?”

“No,” says Newt, confused. “I just thought you seemed, well-, well never mind.”

They stare at one another, and this time it’s Newt who looks away first. Frustrated, he realises that he’s simply unable to come up with anything that sounds natural enough to act as a topic of light conversation. Because really, why on earth  _ would _ he be making light conversation with the man who’d acted as a stowaway, hidden in plain sight,  _ spied on him _ -, and no, he mustn’t become angry all over again, that’s not the point of all this.

“I should be going,” he says, and pushes himself to his feet. Graves, seemingly startled by the sudden change of direction, freezes for a second and then rises hurriedly too. 

“Yes, right. Do you need me to see you to the door?” He offers Newt an awkward smile, then amends, “The main door. Of the building.”

“No, I know where that is,” Newt replies, mystified. 

“Of course you do.” 

For a second Newt’s sure he sees the Director’s eyes slip closed, but then he’s smiling that courteous, professional smile of his, the one he puts on whenever he’s in public, and Newt squints at him. The man seems to be entirely off his game today, and Newt’s not sure what to make of it. If he didn’t know any better he’d say the Director has been waiting for him to say something specific throughout this whole uncomfortable encounter. What that might be, Newt cannot say.

“I’m sure I’ll see you around before I leave,” he manages, and regrets it immediately. Graves looks at him, and the doubt in his eyes doesn’t match the smile on his lips. Even Newt, so confused by the man, can read the contrast there. One emotion is true, the other is most certainly a facade. 

“Newt,” Graves says, then stops. He draws in a deep breath, appears to reconsider his words and then offers his hand to be shaken. “I’m glad you were here to take care of the beasts. We couldn’t have done that without you.”

Newt takes his hand; the Director’s grip is firm and surprisingly warm, his hands lacking the callouses that mark Newt’s palms. “Well, if you find any more, Mr Graves, be sure to let me know.”

He’s not sure he means it as a gesture of goodwill, but he certainly wouldn’t be averse to removing magical beasts from an unfriendly system before they become irretrievably embroiled in it. Graves merely gives him that strange half-smile of his, and Newt, still confused, takes his leave.

  
  


*

 

“I told you, I knew something was up the moment he brought the coffee. He doesn’t even like coffee!”

“What a remarkable detective you are, Percival,” Ibrahim murmurs, sipping his tea. “I’m still not convinced he didn’t offer you his own simply to stop you from eating him.”

“He doesn’t like coffee,” Percival repeats stubbornly, hands buried deep in his trouser pockets, jacket rucked up around his wrists as he stares gloomily out of the window. The meeting room they’re in is tiny, but it commands an impressive view of the city below. The single table is covered with Ismail’s paperwork, the man having relocated here when his cluttered office no longer had room left for him to comfortably work. He leans back in his chair and looks up at his friend standing moody and brooding at the window.

“What’s the matter, my friend? You’re as grim as a Barghest today.”

Percival glances at him over his shoulder, then snorts, offering him an apologetic wince. “Sorry, I’m terrible company at the moment. I just-,” he sighs sharply in frustration, shaking his head. He turns slowly from the window, drawing a hand from his pocket and massaging his temples lightly. “I saw him again today, and it was damned hard not to say anything. I was there doing my damnedest not to scare him off, but he’s so ridiculously quiet. He won’t say a thing unless I drag it out of him!”

Ismail sighs. “You’re still intent on courting him then?”

“Well, not if he’s going to continue like this I’m not,” Graves laughs bitterly, letting out a frustrated breath at the idea.

At this, Ismail snorts indelicately. “What do you  _ expect  _ him to do?” he asks in exasperation. 

“Well I was hoping he’d make some kind of move, give me an opening! Even if it was anger it’d be something! But no, nothing.” Percival pulls out a chair and sits down heavily. “I’m not going to keep chasing after him like an idiot.”

“Well, you could have fooled me.”

Percival puts one elbow up on the table and leans his forehead against his fingers. He looks across at his friend from beneath them, and says, “ _ Am _ I being an idiot?”

“Yes,” Ismail replies frankly.

Graves lets out a long breath, and closes his eyes. “What do I do, old man?” he asks quietly. 

“Damned well apologise,” his friend replies. “Man up and tell him you didn’t intend to offend him. State your case, and if he’s still not interested well, you tried. But honestly, Percy, for Merlin’s sake, get a grip, man. You’re too old to be acting like this.”

“Like what?” Percival murmurs, and there’s no heat behind his words.

“Like an arrogant young brat.”

Percival snorts softly, and opens his eyes to watch as Ismail, case firmly stated, returns to his tea. The last week has cooled Percival’s indignation to a slow burn of wounded pride and the first subtle twinges of guilt. Perhaps he had overreacted somewhat. He’s done a lot of that recently, he acknowledges privately, relying on the deep burn of rage to carry him through the difficulties of a shamed auror department, a frightened public and an accusatory press. Maybe he ought to have considered this from Newt’s perspective more carefully, truly considered it rather than seeing it entirely as yet another attack on his integrity.  _ Maybe a lot of things, _ he thinks.

“All right, old man. I hear you.”  

Wisely, Ismail doesn’t reply. Percival gets to his feet, casting his eye over the mess of paperwork on the table. “It’s late. Come out to the club with me. I promise you I won’t brood. I’ll write him a note tomorrow, that way he can do with it what he will. If he wants to meet up and pursue a friendship, then we shall. If he never wants to hear from me again, well, that’s his choice.”

Setting down his teacup, Ismail sends it scurrying to tidy itself away with a flick of his fingers, and begins to pick up his paperwork. “As long you don’t leave me to fend off that old witch who’s got her eye on you like you did the last time.”

“Who? Me? What old witch?” Percival spreads his hands wide in offended disbelief.

“Meridia Mazelock! Don’t pretend you didn’t foist her off on me and make a break for it. You practically threw yourself out of the room!”

“I did not, damn you. You lie!”

Arguing amicably, the two aurors make their way out into the corridors and head for the elevators.

  
  


*

  
  


“It’ll just be a few drinks.”

Harris is leaning on Tina’s desk, looking at Newt with interest, while Tina tidies away her paperwork.

“I’m not really one for drinking,” Newt says, giving the man his best placatory smile and glancing sideways at the rest of the team gathering up their things ready to leave. The eight of them are planning to go out and descend on one of the nearby speakeasies for the night, and Harris, intent on getting Tina to join them, has figured his chances of that will increase if he can encourage her friend along too. “You should go though, Tina. I have a lot of work to be getting on with. You know, with the beasts.”

Tina looks uncomfortable, and Newt knows she’s eager to go out with the others, yet unwilling to leave him behind. “Newt, just come for a little while?” she encourages, and he can see how much she wants to go from the look in her eyes. He understands of course, being so new to the team she wants to do as they do in order to fit in.

“I really think you don’t need me along to slow you down,” he says. “Go out and have fun, please don’t let me stop you.”

“You should come too, we don’t bite.” Harris is smirking, and as much as Newt thinks he means well, he can’t help but be irritated by him. 

“I’m really quite certain, thank you. I’m sure you’ll all have a good time.”

“We won’t even make you dance, I promise!” Harris laughs, and then straightens up, attention on something over Newt’s shoulder. “Hey, boss and boss! You coming to the Grimes with us tonight?”

Newt stiffens when he hears the Director’s voice from behind him, closer than he’d expected. He turns awkwardly, and there’s Graves with that friend of his right next to him. 

“Off dancing?” Graves asks as he and his companion wander closer. 

“We are. Can’t get Scamander to come out though, think we’ve spooked him already.”   
  
“I’m not really one for that kind of thing,” Newt says stiffly, stung by the auror’s comment. It’s not that he minds drinking and a little dancing, but if he’s going to do such things then it’ll be with friends, he thinks.

“Entirely understandable,” Graves replies, then raises his voice to address the rest of the bull pen. “Might I remind you all that you carry the reputation of this establishment with you wherever you go. Your faces are known, people. Don’t make me come out there and arrest you for disorderly conduct and being an embarrassment to MACUSA.”

Since this comment is greeted by jeers and laughter, Newt surmises it’s routine. On the other hand, having firsthand experience of the way his brother’s friends have acted in the past, he suspects it’s only half a joke. 

“Not your style, Newt?” Graves says to him, more quietly, and Newt blinks in surprise. 

“Uh, no, not really. Too crowded for me,” he says, offering a brief, apologetic smile before looking away.

Graves hums, nodding, and then says suddenly. “Ismail and I are heading to the club if you’d prefer something more relaxed.”

Newt looks up to see the Director looking back at him, expression a curious mix of determination and expectancy. Beside him, Ismail is staring at his companion with raised eyebrows, as though the man has just pulled a live rabbit from his sleeve. 

“Uh, well, I-  _ ow _ ! _ Fuck! _ ”

Newt jerks sideways, lifting his foot up with a gasp, and turning with a pained expression to rub at his lower leg. 

“Newt?” 

Both Harris and Graves reach for him in surprise, but Newt pushes their hands away. “Sorry,  _ cramp _ ,” he grits out, glaring at Tina as he flexes his ankle. She affects a looks of concern which simply makes him scowl harder. 

Percival has put a hand on his elbow to steady him, and Newt can feel himself beginning to flush with embarrassment. He’d not meant to curse quite so casually in front of his audience, but he fully understands the message Tina’s sharp kick had been sending. “The club?” he grates out, giving her one last lingering glare.

“Ah, it’s just somewhere we go for a bit of peace. It’s very private, you’d be our guest of course,” Graves replies, finally letting go of his elbow but still hovering far too close for comfort.

“No writing?” Ismail murmurs cryptically, and Graves shakes his head fractionally. 

“Change of plan, let’s just get on with it,” he says to him. Then, turning the full force of his attention on Newt, he says, “I mean, of course, only if you’re looking for a change of scene.”

_ Not really,  _ Newt thinks, increasingly aware of the interest building in Harris’s expression. No doubt this whole thing is going to be a prime topic of conversation at the MI team outing tonight.  “Of course,” he says weakly. “Why not?”

Suddenly the plan to actually accept the next invite the Director sends his way seems like a truly awful one, and Newt is immediately filled with remorse for ever agreeing to go along with Tina’s idea. From the satisfied smile on Graves’ lips, to the quietly bemused, or perhaps  _ amused, _ look on Ismail’s face, Newt is entirely sure he’s not ready for this.

“Well then,” Graves says, with all the satisfaction of a jaguar with his dinner before him. “Shall we?”

Newt makes an unconvinced noise that’s not at all a whimper, and offers a weak smile in response.

“Let’s,” Ismail says for him kindly.

  
  


*

  
  


The club is in the finest of the central districts of New York, recently constructed buildings in the modern high-rise style soaring towards the stars on all sides, the streets full of people even at this hour. Newt allows himself to be side-alonged by Graves, the three of them apparating into a small, windowless room, lit only by oil lamps, with a solitary, grimacing goblin sat reading a book on a rickety chair in the corner. He grunts at them and the two aurors nod briefly in his direction, before heading for the exit. A single door set into the wall glows green with runes and opens beneath Graves’ touch to lead out onto the nighttime street. Newt glances back over his shoulder as the door closes behind them - a plain, unmarked black on this side with no bell or handle, just a single small keyhole. 

Newt allows himself to be led to the imposing entrance of a nearby building, its facade brightly lit and its steps guarded by a uniformed doorman. The two aurors are obviously recognised, and the three of them are waved through into the gleaming marble and brass hallway beyond. Once inside the three of them file in to a simple elevator operated by a smartly dressed house elf. Newt tries not to stare at the creature as they rise swiftly up the floors, even though it ignores him completely. It’s not common to see such a smartly-dressed house elf as this, and for a moment he almost doubts his own analysis of its species.

“Have you eaten?” Graves asks suddenly, and for a split-second Newt considers lying. Then the empty hole in his belly reminds him of its presence and he thinks how embarrassing it would be to sit still all evening with a growling stomach interrupting every few minutes. 

“Ah, no, I was going to get something at home.”

“Hm,” Graves nods. “We’ll sit in the parlour then.”

The parlour, and indeed the whole club, turns out to be a smartly appointed establishment covering the twentieth and twenty-first floors of the building. Graves takes them on a brief tour of the place, leading his two companions through finely decorated rooms filled with armchairs and gaming tables, bookshelves and smoking dens. Leather and dark wood predominate, and the soft golden glow of old-fashioned candle and oil lighting warms the rooms. The place is sparsely populated by witches and wizards, all of them past the age of majority, and each one of them dressed smartly, be that in robes or modern no-maj wear. Newt feels briefly ill at ease considering he’s hardly dressed up for the occasion, and Graves seems to sense this, for he waves his hand and says, “Formal robes are only required when there’s an event on, we’re fine for tonight.”

“What is this place?” Newt asks, as they make their way through a silent library, almost as large as the one at Hogwarts. 

Graves shrugs, hands in his pockets as he turns to regard Newt with a smile. He seems pleased to be able to show this place off to him, entirely at home in its environs. “This room or…?”

“Well, the whole place really!”

“Ah. It’s the Twenty-Twenty-One, or just the club. It’s mostly for Ilvermorny alumni, from certain groups.”

“There’s an entrance requirement then?” Newt asks shrewdly.

“Well,” and here Graves shrugs again, entirely unfazed. “You certainly need an invite. How do you think Ibrahim scrapes in?”

“Hm,” Newt replies, following the pair of them back through the tangle of rooms. At some point they lose Ismail to the company of an elderly, white-haired wizard lurking in a small, out of the way smoking room, leaving him there to pull out his pipe and settle down to gossip. Honestly, Newt’s not sure he minds losing the other man’s presence. On the one hand it leaves him alone with the Director, but on the other that means it’ll make it easier to broach certain topics once they finally settle down.

Their tour ends back on the twentieth floor, in a large corner room filled with cloth-draped tables and lined on two sides with windows looking out over the city. The rich scent of cooked food floats on the air, and Newt can hear the chime of cutlery on china. He feels his stomach grumble in response, and hastily clears his throat to cover the noise. 

Graves leads him over to a table in the corner where they can command a truly magnificent view out over night time New York, and pulls off his jacket, hanging it somewhat casually over the back of his chair. They’re not alone in here, for the room is occupied by a trio of wizards drinking coffee in the opposite corner, an elderly pair of witches playing after dinner cards, and a much younger witch reading a book over her meal, a tawny-coated cat sitting on the table waiting patiently for some of her fish. 

Graves turns his attention to the view as Newt looks around, and by the time Newt’s finished taking in their surroundings, another of those smartly dressed house elves has appeared to take their orders. She greets Graves by name, asks after Newt’s, and then takes their orders, vanishing to return mere minutes later with their food. The speed of it takes Newt completely by surprise; he’d been busy trying to work out how to start a conversation that didn’t sound entirely inane or that let on just how intimidated he feels by the opulence of their surroundings. He’s heard of secret clubs like this for the finest and most well-connected members of magical society, but he’s never had the chance, or really the desire, to be in one. 

They eat in silence, and the food is excellent, which is hardly a surprise at all. Newt concentrates on his food, and somehow, to his surprise, rather than being tense or awkward, the quiet between them seems strangely companionable. Almost as soon as they finish with their plates the house elf vanishes them, and, satisfied but still far too nervous to order more than a main course, Newt turns to fiddling with his sleeves as he waits for Graves to finish his wine.

“Shall we take a bottle through with us?” Graves asks, seeing that Newt is starting to fidget. 

“Hm?” Newt leans forward, eyebrows raised, so busy with his thoughts he’d almost missed the comment.

“Come,” Graves smiles. He raps on the table and the house elf is back. “Send a bottle of that red we were drinking through to the Albert room would you? And two fresh glasses. Let’s go, Newt.”

Graves leads him back through the meandering rooms of the club, making their way through large spaces filled with armchairs and warmed by roaring fires, and then down a short, oak-panelled corridor, to a tiny sitting room. There’s two plush old leather armchairs before the fire, and Newt can make out another pushed back into the corner out of the way. The walls are lined with books and above the fire hangs an old painting of a rather serious looking man. Newt recognises him from the papers back home; royalty from the other side.

“That’s a muggle painting,” Newt comments in surprise as he takes a seat by the fire.

Percival, busy pouring the wine that’s already in place on the sideboard, looks up and offers a wry smile. “And of a no-maj I’m sure you recognise. Though he’s as silent now as his painting.” He hands a glass of gleaming red wine to Newt. “All the paintings in the private rooms are no-maj, or at least don’t have people in them. It helps to keep the place discreet, you understand?”

Newt takes the glass and nods, settling himself back more comfortably as Graves takes the seat opposite. He’d closed the door behind them when they entered and that, along with the comment about paintings and discretion, has already begun to put Newt on edge. He toys nervously with his glass, resting it against his bottom lip as though he can hide behind its curve. Graves, for his part, stares into the fire. He’s taken his jacket off again but kept his tie unloosened and his sleeves neatly down. Newt watches him carefully out of the corner of his eye, waiting to see if he’ll offer any kind of opening. He doesn’t, gaze fixed on the leaping flames, wine forgotten in his hand. 

He looks, Newt thinks, really rather tired.

“Why did you ask me here, Director?” he asks softly.

Graves sighs quietly and looks down into the glass cradled between his fingers. His mouth twists into something approximating a smile, but it’s directed inwards, any wry humour to the expression aimed squarely at himself. “I wanted to talk to you,” he says eventually. “Without all the others around, and things-, well, without things getting in the way.”

Newt feels a chill creep down his body despite the heat of the fire, his wary anticipation turning suddenly to dread. “About what?” he asks, and hears it when the words come out more strangled than he intends.

Graves looks up at him from beneath lowered brows, and his face is uncertain. He hesitates a moment, then says carefully, “I think we got off on the wrong foot, the two of us.” He pauses, looking for Newt’s reaction, and when he receives no reply, continues, “I never intended to offend you, Newt. But I understand you feel that I’ve invaded your privacy, and I wanted to assure you that I never meant to do that.”

He falls silent, waiting. The fire continues to crackle in the grate, and from one dim corner there’s the soft ticking of a grandmother clock keeping stately time. The quiet is broken by Newt’s sudden snort. “ _ Really? _ ” he demands in disbelief. 

Graves looks unhappy, and makes as though to say something, but then appears to stop himself. Instead, he meets Newt’s gaze evenly, his eyes serious. Newt shakes his head slowly. “You really never intended to invade my privacy? At what point did accepting my help become an excuse to eavesdrop on me then, Mr Graves?”

“Newt, I didn’t-” he begins, but Newt doesn’t give him the chance to interrupt, cutting him short, the fingers of his free hand curling into a fist. Suddenly that anger he’d been so carefully keeping in check rushes through him, returning in full, glorious force. 

“You  _ did. _ I’m not angry that you came to me, I think you would have died if we’d not run into one another, but you ought to have said something sooner!” 

Newt realises with some annoyance that he’s losing his breath to his rage, his breathing made uneven with the sudden shock of emotion. It’s making him forget his nervousness around Graves, MACUSA’s most powerful wizard or not, and he leans forward in his chair to glare at him. Privacy is of utmost concern to Newt, and to have Graves trample all over it and not even properly acknowledge what he’s done is breathtakingly offensive to him. “Instead you let me believe you were a familiar! Oh by Merlin, I was very foolish, wasn’t I? You really played me well, Mr Graves. Very well indeed, although I suppose that’s your job.”

Graves winces, shaking his head, but doesn’t say anything. He looks somewhat stricken, and there’s a flush to his cheeks that’s either embarrassment or anger, Newt cannot tell. In all honesty, he’d expected to have been cut off himself by now, but the Director continues to hold his tongue and that in itself only serves to infuriate Newt even more. He pauses in his tirade, staring at Graves who sits with his head bent, frowning down into the wine glass he holds folded between both hands. He’s not fighting back, and it makes Newt’s fury seem somehow overblown and out of proportion. Seething, he draws a breath, bringing his anger back under control, and then asks as coldly as he can, “ _ Why?” _

Graves looks up at him, apparently to see if this really is a question that Newt expects to be answered, and then, seeing the anger in his eyes, takes a deep breath of his own before he replies. “I told you that I was on an investigation in the forest, I believe. It was something I’ve been working on for a long time, ongoing for a few years because of a number of setbacks we’d experienced back in the summer-,” he stops, reading the taut expression on Newt’s face, and shakes his head. “Never mind, it’s not important.” 

He shifts his grip on his wine, and the glass catches the firelight, running liquid gold around its rim. Graves wets his lips once, and says, “I touched a stolen artefact while I was in my jaguar form, and it cursed me. It locked me into that shape, and I couldn’t get out. I couldn’t use my magic either and I was weak. The perpetrator returned, he cut me up, but I escaped. I ran into you some time later, and the rest you know.”

One of the logs in the grate breaks in half with a sharp crack, its component pieces tumbling down to rest in a pile of glowing embers. The sound is very loud in the confines of their small sitting room, and Newt flinches briefly, then grimaces in annoyance. “All right,” he says simply. “Why did you not simply tell me who you were?”

“Newt-,”

“You didn’t even try to contradict me! You could have at least tried to tell me you weren’t really a jaguar!”

Graves wipes his forehead with the back of one hand, and places his wine glass on a small side table. He shifts uncomfortably in his seat, and Newt can see his forehead glistening with a sheen of sweat. He looks unwell all of a sudden, and somewhat pale, and a brief, ugly stab of satisfaction at his plight flits through Newt. He pushes it down a moment later as unkind, but with the anger still roiling in his veins can’t find it in himself to be too sorry for the thought. 

“The curse,” Grave starts, and then stops, shaking his head again. “I couldn’t, Newt. I don’t know why, but I couldn’t. I wanted to write you a note, in the snow perhaps, or send you a sign of some kind, but whenever I tried to focus on writing it was as if I couldn’t see the words, like I’d forgotten how to write them down. My head was full of  _ mist, _ as though I’d forgotten parts of, of being a wizard. It was, well, it was deeply unnerving.”

“You should have tried something,” Newt says quietly, entirely unforgiving as he rides the confidence his anger has given him.

“I did,” Graves insists, just as quietly, leaning forward in his chair towards Newt. “I tried to talk to Queenie. I expected her to be able to read my mind, but she couldn’t. The curse again I suppose, I really don’t know. I’ve never encountered her in that form before. I think all I succeeded in doing was embarrassing her in front of that guy of hers, and probably scaring the hell out of the both of them.”

Newt holds his breath, eyes fixed on Graves’ face. “I’m sure they’d rather just forget the whole matter,” he says. “We played it off that you were just Nox, one of my beasts. It’s not come up again.”

To his relief, Graves simply nods gratefully, wiping his fingers across his forehead and grimacing. “Thank you,” he rasps, then clears his throat. “I was getting desperate, Newt. We were back in New York and I needed to get to someone who would recognise me and break the curse. And you know my identity, my  _ nature _ , isn’t widely known. I-, I couldn’t risk just anyone finding out.”

Newt huffs a soft, bitter laugh at the irony of that. 

“You understand, surely, that some of the-, ...some of the  _ things _ I said to you I never said to anyone else?” he says, so quietly it’s almost a whisper.

“I know,” Graves says simply, and closes his eyes for a moment. “I-, listen. Newt, listen. I-, as an animagus, it’s-” he breaks off, shaking his head. Shifting himself to the edge of his armchair he leans towards Newt, lifting his hands as though to somehow describe in movement the experience of his nature to him. “It’s as though you become something else, I mean that’s clearly what’s happening, but-,” Graves pauses, turning his head to the side to cough and clear his throat. He turns back, and Newt watches him search for the right words.

“Imagine you’re a jaguar. And that’s all you are, all you’ve ever known. When you’re in your animal form, it’s all there ever has been. It’s not that you  _ forget _ who you are, just that you no longer have the capacity to, to understand some of the things you once knew. I’m not being very articulate about this, I’m sorry.” Graves shakes his head, and Newt notices again how flushed he seems. More than embarrassment or anger, he seems to be discomforted physically.

“Mr Graves,” he asks, suddenly wary. “Are you quite all right?”

Graves looks at him, and to Newt’s alarm he realises that the man’s breathing has become deeper and more erratic than even the awkwardness of the situation might warrant. “I, ah, I think that wine may not have agreed with me,” Graves winces, and wipes the ball of his palm across his brow. “I just need you to understand that while I was sharing living quarters with you, I was, really. I’m sorry, you’re going to have to excuse me.”

Newt sits up in alarm as the Director quite suddenly rises to his feet. He takes a step, then pauses, turns to Newt with the most curious expression of confusion on his face, and gasps a small sound of distress. Newt straightens in alarm, eyes going wide with shock as Graves suddenly winces, hisses a curse, and seems to stumble forwards and down, falling with outstretched hands towards the floor.

In his comparatively shortened stint at Hogwarts, Newt had nonetheless met an animagus, and had even seen her transform right in front of him when she’d agreed to display the ability for the amusement of her fellow house members. So it’s not that he hasn’t seen an animagus transform before, more that it’s such an unexpectedly fluid and surprisingly inoffensive transformation that even knowing what’s happening it still manages to catch him off guard.

In the flickering light of the lamps and the glowing log fire, Nox’s pelt gleams with warmth, the firelight picking out the subtle rosettes hidden in his colouring. Newt stares at the jaguar, large in this small sitting room, and pulls his feet away, instinctively drawing back in his chair. 

“Wh-what are you doing…?” he asks, aghast at this behaviour. If this is somehow an attempt to escape a difficult conversation, then Newt’s not sure whether he ought to be angry or impressed at the man’s cheek. And then Nox turns to look at him with such horror, that even written in a jaguar’s eyes the emotion is quite clear. 

Some small, detached part of Newt thinks,  _ not Nox, no. Percival Graves, remember? _ as he leans forward in his seat and without looking, sets his wine glass slowly down on the table next to him. The jaguar is panting in what Newt can only interpret as fear, his ears pinned back, tail thrashing in agitation, great yellowed claws bared and digging deep into the plush carpet. His distress is obvious, and Newt can see him looking around with the air of a person trying, and failing, to do something to address the situation. Newt can only assume that he’s making some kind of attempt to transform back. After a long, drawn-out moment of nothing happening, Graves looks at him again, his now golden eyes blown wide in horrified beseechment. Clearly, this transformation has not been of his own volition, and the two of them stare at one another in shocked disbelief.

“Oh bugger,” Newt whispers.

For such a large beast, the jaguar’s answering whine is truly piteous.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ooooh noooooo! Dun dun duuuun! That’s the end of part 2. ;3 Anyone who was looking for more Newt/Nox cuddles - I got you covered!
> 
> In all seriousness though, part 3 has a lot of plot and character interaction to get through, so although I have the chapters fully planned out, I reserve the right to break them down further into smaller chapters, primarily so I can get them posted faster. I know I said 11 chapters and an epilogue, but I also said this fic would max out at 30k words and look where we are now. You should know not to trust me by now when I say anything about wordcount or the like.
> 
> As ever, you are all fantastic with your encouragement, and it's honestly that which keeps me tapping away at the keyboard knowing you're still following along. So thank you so much to everyone who reads, or comments or drops kudos. :]


	10. To The North

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fixing cursed jaguars is going to take more than simply waving a magic wand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have learned so much about 1920s trains, guys. Like, so much. And train snow ploughs too. It’s seriously interesting stuff, barely any of which is in this story. Anyway, 1920s first class trains were incredibly opulent. I’ve based the descriptions below very loosely on the Pullman trains, because they had the coolest pictures. Actual armchairs. Compare it to first class on modern First Great Western and laugh.
> 
> Any train errors are obviously mine, and probably there just to make the story work.

 

 

**Part 3 - Consequences**

  
  


Newt goes down on one knee, and Percival steps in close to meet him. Putting his hands either side of the jaguar’s head he buries his fingers in the fur around his neck and holds him still to peer into his eyes. Percival looks back at him in striking gold, as Newt searches for some confirmation that he still possesses all his faculties. The jaguar has closed his mouth, the raspy panting ceasing for a moment, and Newt says, “Mr Graves, are you still in there?”

A sharp grunt in response tells him that even in this form Graves retains his impatience. “All right,” Newt says soothingly, “Just checking, this is-, this is somewhat unexpected.”

As best he can he lets his magical senses extend out over the jaguar’s body, searching for the weave of his magic and the nature of his affliction. The curse again, Newt thinks to himself, rather than any disease. It’s more likely at least. He’s no expert in the field of curse-breaking, not by a long shot, but he’s had some reason over the years to put what he does know into practice. Dumbledore’s private tuition all those years ago has come in useful on more than one occasion, for there are plenty of magical beasts quite capable of cursing in self-defence. Still, just like the first time he’d encountered Percival in this form, he simply lacks the expertise to pick out the strands of the affliction.

“Keep still for me,” he murmurs. “I’m just looking to see if I can find what’s causing it.” 

Carefully, he runs his palm down the jaguar’s spine, following the lines of his natural energy flow, then on down his legs, looking for snarl-ups or blockages in the lines of his magic. He frowns; just as it had been the first time when he’d rescued Graves, his innate magical nature is so dim as to be practically non-existent. He feels like a normal beast, not a wizard in beast form. 

“I should be able to sense something of your magic, shouldn’t I?” he asks uncertainly, and Graves makes an unhappy sound that Newt takes as an affirmative. Perplexed, he leans back on his heels, letting his hand drop from Graves’ flank. The jaguar turns his head to look over his shoulder at him, and that unhappy panting starts up again.

“I think I need to get you back to the Woolworth Building,” Newt says, and the jaguar steps away from him. “No? I wasn’t going to apparate us, don’t worry. I know you can’t get in that way-, where are you-? Hey! Wait!”

Newt makes a grab for the only part of Graves he can still reach, as the animagus makes a break for the door. Giving his thick tail a sharp tug, Newt says “ _ Wait! _ ”

Percival turns with a growl to glare at him, but Newt says, “You can’t just go running around out there, you’re supposed to be a secret, remember?”

Graves snarls in frustration, but he doesn’t move. Instead he glares, and after a second, very pointedly sniffs the air. If only jaguars had eyebrows to raise. Newt looks at him blankly, then draws in a breath. “Right. Ismail!” Newt nods and gets to his feet. “All right, fine. You find him, I’ll keep an eye out for people.”

In the end it’s late enough that most of the club’s members are already tucked away in their little side-rooms or gathered together in larger, avoidable groups in the main halls. Percival leads Newt on a twisting path through narrow corridors and lesser-used chambers, clambering up and down rickety little staircases that have no business being present in such a modern building, and yet somehow still are. Someone’s pocket dimension Newt assumes, and tries not to think too hard about it all. Some types of extension charm can notice when they’re being paid attention to, and their response can be nausea-inducing. 

Eventually, Percival comes to a halt outside a closed door and looks pointedly up at Newt. He steps forward and knocks politely on the dark wood, trying to push the jaguar back out of the way so that he won’t be the first thing someone sees when they open the door. Instead he hears a quavery old voice call out for them to enter, surprise writ clear in its tone.

“Just stay back,” Newt whispers to Graves, and then opens the door. 

Ismail and his ancient wizard friend are sitting on opposite sides of a small table in the little drawing room beyond, a chessboard set between them and a pot of something steaming gently to one side.

“Mr Scamander,” Ismail says in surprise, and then Percival pushes past Newt, stepping into the doorway next to him.

“Oh!” exclaims the elderly wizard, adjusting his glasses on his nose. “That’s a very fine beast you have there. What’s his name?”

Newt looks him straight in the eye, his mind immediately blank of choices and excuses alike, and says, “Nox. He’s my familiar.”

“Oh, how wonderfully exotic!”

“Yes, he is rather,” Newt says drily, and beside him Graves snarls briefly. “And bad-tempered too. Though don’t worry, he’s well-trained, he does exactly what I tell him to.”

Ismail is staring at Newt with eyebrows fully raised, and Newt turns his attention to him. “Sorry, Mr Ismail. Something’s come up, do you think you could come back to the Woolworth Building with me?”

Setting his cup down on the table next to him, Ismail blinks at the request, then rises to his feet. “Sorry, Elijah, duty calls.”

“Quite, quite, don’t let me detain you. Pleasure to meet you both, young fellow,  _ Nox _ . What a fine animal.”

“Don’t flatter him, he’ll be unbearable for days,” Newt says, and reaches down to give his familiar a friendly pat on the head.

With Ismail ushering them to the door, they leave before the conversation can be continued, and Graves has chance to bite his hand off.

  
  


*

 

The Assistant Director’s office is cramped, filled as it is with so many people. The trip back to the Woolworth Building had been on foot, Ismail shaking his head over the suggestion of apparition. “Not a good idea,” he’d said. “I’m not willing to risk it right now, this curse isn’t quite what I thought it was.” And so they’d threaded their way back through the city the difficult way, carefully covered by a  _ notice-me-not _ charm, making use of back alleys and every shadow they can find. To Newt’s complete lack of surprise, once they arrive there are private elevators in the Woolworth Building that allow them access to restricted corridors where the general magical public are not allowed to tread, and it’s these they make use of to get back up to the Major Investigations floor. Even so Newt has to keep Graves close to his heel when they first come up on the building in the hope that anyone subtle enough to see through Ismail’s charms will simply assume the jaguar to be another one of his beasts.

When they’d finally arrived in the familiar bullpen, several of the senior aurors had already returned from their drinking and were gathered in a loose group around Alverez’s desk. Sensing something interesting afoot, they’d been more than happy to trail along behind the three of them to Ismail’s office, and the Assistant Director, much to Newt’s concern, hadn’t made any move to stop them. Now, all seven of them are crowded into the small room, looking on as Ismail runs a set of diagnostic charms over their boss.

“Cyclical?” Okafor murmurs, as he passes a palm across Grave’s flank, his dark fingers an inch from the jaguar’s even darker fur. 

“Yes,” Ibrahim replies thoughtfully. “I think so. Look, you see where it loops back on itself? Tethered.” Okafor nods, and the two of them walk a slow circle around Ismail’s desk, peering closely at points only they appear able to see. Percival stands like a beast on display on top of the hastily cleared desk, tail lashing in agitation beneath their scrutiny. 

“And you were in the Twenty-Twenty-One when it happened?” Harris leans in towards Newt, voice low and interested. At Newt’s distracted confirmation he grins. “What’s it like in there?”

“ _ John _ ,” Tina hushes him. 

“Don’t know why you’re so interested, Harris,” Alverez drawls. “You’ll never step foot in the place, so why’s it matter to you?”

Irritated by the aurors’ back-and-forth in the face of such a crisis, Newt pushes away from the three of them and moves to the other side of Ismail’s desk. He steps up to Ibrahim’s side and the Assistant Director turns to him. “And there were no triggers?” he asks. “Nothing out of place, no others present, no indications of anything amiss?”

Newt shakes his head blankly. “No.”

Ismail hums thoughtfully to himself. “Harris, go down and get-...” he pulls out a notepad from one of the desk drawers and flips it open. “Box 42-C-Algiz from the lockup and bring it up here. And what were you doing when it happened?”   
  


“Well,” Newt pauses as Harris leaves the room, trying to think. He looks at Graves who returns the look steadily. “We were talking, just-, talking, and, uhm, he said, the wine wasn’t agreeing with him maybe?”

Graves growls and begins to turn an agitated circle on the desk. Ismail puts a hand on his shoulder to bring his attention back to the conversation. “The house elves brought the wine?” Graves snatches at the cuff of his sleeve with his teeth, and Ismail frowns. 

Newt steps up. “He doesn’t think it’s the wine,” he interprets, and Ismail raises an eyebrow at him. 

“I see.”

Newt looks closely at Graves, allowing his physical and magical senses to blur together, like letting his gaze unfocus, looking for the fine traceries of magic that Ismail and Okafor can see, but to his eyes there is nothing. 

“Well, for what it’s worth, I agree with him.” Ismail looks at Okafor, who nods. “Rather, I believe this curse is tied back to the artefact he ‘recovered’ from the north.” Although he says it delicately, without mention of any errant nose-touching, Graves still growls at him, low and warning.

“Artefact?” Newt says. “Oh, the one that cursed him the first time?”   
  
He feels the aurors around him collectively tilt their heads in interest, and Ismail offers a wry half-smile. “Yes, that’s the one,” he says, even as Newt winces. That, clearly, hadn’t been common knowledge. “And when auror Harris returns we can put our theory to the test.”

It takes Harris another ten minutes to come back, during which time Newt can see that Graves remains up on the desk only through great effort of will. He’s showing all the signs of stress that Newt’s learned to recognise in a beast, be it magical or otherwise, and were he in Newt’s care Newt would have taken him down into his habitat by now and given him some space to roam, maybe a potion to help calm him some. But instead he holds his peace, unwilling to show the Director up any further in front of his aurors. For the life of him Newt can’t understand why Ismail hasn’t sent the rest of them away by now.

Finally, Harris returns, bringing with him a rune-marked lead box which he places carefully on the edge of the desk. Everyone gathers round, and, slipping on a pair of magic-resistant gloves, Ismail lifts the lid to reveal a small bone carving nestled on a lining of white fur. His eyes are on Graves as he lifts the lid, and Newt feels the aurors around him tense in reaction to something. Newt’s watching Percival too, and he sees the shiver of movement that goes across the jaguar’s skin at the same time as he feels the temperature in the room drop. Suddenly there’s the unmistakable scent of the ocean on the air, and the sharp tang of blood. Newt recognises somehow, without quite knowing how, the scent of snow and the far north. He can hear the crack of the ice floes and smell the fruits of a successful hunt. He looks from the shivering jaguar to the carving curled in the box and says, “That’s Inuit.”

Ismail slides the lid closed and the room returns to its former warmth, the light altering subtly as though it had somehow changed to a low, dim slant of sunlight and back without anyone realising. “Inuit?” he says quietly, eyes still on Percival.

“Mhm,” Newt agrees. He steps forward to reach for Percival, intending to check him over, but Harris suddenly has a grip on his upper arm, holding him in place. The auror shakes his head once, and Newt relents, settling back in place as Okafor begins to read Graves’ aura again. After a moment he steps back. “It appears to be safe,” he says.

Ismail turns to Newt. “Inuit?” he asks again.

Newt nods. “Hard to say which group, I don’t know enough about them, but it’s definitely Inuit. I’ve seen such things before.”

Ismail hesitates a moment, then begins to draw off the thick gloves. “And where does one find the Inuit?” he asks slowly.

“Oh, uhm, north of course. Canada really. Uhm, I don’t really know enough to say where exactly. But, since that’s a seal carving, probably whale bone? I would suggest it’s likely one of the coastal groups. I mean, I’m not sure if anyone else could smell the ocean just then, but, well, that would give a strong indication as to its origin.”

There’s a beat of silence. “You mean the Eskimo?” Harris frowns. 

“Mm, yes, well. Eskimo, yes. Inuit. That’s how they refer to themselves.”

Setting the pair of gloves carefully down on the desk, Ismail folds his arms. “And how did you come to know about the...Inuit...Newt?”

Aware now that everyone is staring at him, Newt can feel himself starting to blush. “I read it,” he says. “In a book.” Which of course he didn’t, but the last thing he wants to do is expose his contacts to MACUSA’s unforgiving scrutiny. The ties he’s developed with what he’s come to think of as the hidden magical communities of America are fragile and built on trust, and that’s not something he’s willing to sacrifice even if so far he’s only conducted them via owl. After all, that first time he’d come to America, releasing Frank hadn’t been the only thing on his agenda. He can feel Ismail looking at him, the man’s dark eyes as probing as they are interested, and instinctively he tightens his mental defences. As charming as Ismail can be, after all, he’s a very senior auror in an entirely merciless Government body. 

“I think we need a moment please, everyone. If I could ask you all to be on your way…” Ismail smiles at the rest of the aurors and raises a hand to the door. Tina gives Newt a meaningful look, and he says, “You too, Miss Goldstein. I’ll send Newt home to you later.”

The four aurors file out, leaving Newt in the company of the Assistant Director, who closes the door gently behind his staff. He turns, and in the quiet of the office the only sound is the jaguar's unhappy panting. Ismail gives Newt a crooked smile, and although there’s nothing at all of threat in it, Newt’s still not certain what’s coming next. He can feel himself tensing, aware that he’s done nothing wrong and yet still finding himself wondering what crimes they might try to pin on him. Next to him Percival has begun to growl. He jumps down from Ismail’s desk, pacing a wide circle around the room. Both Ismail and Newt watch him for a moment, but he doesn’t stop, just keeps on pacing.

“Percy,” Ibrahim says, trying to draw his attention. “You must try and stay calm, my friend.”

“He’s not listening to you,” Newt says, and goes down on one knee as the jaguar draws close again reaching out to hook an arm around his neck and direct his path inwards. Graves tries to duck out from beneath Newt’s arms, but Newt won’t let him. “Hey, hey listen. Stop.  _ Listen _ to me. We’ll sort this out, just be patient for a moment.  _ Nox.” _

It gets his attention, even if it is simply due to irritation, and Newt gives him a half-smile. “Hm, thought that’d make you listen.” He buries his fingers in the looser fur around the jaguar’s neck and holds on for a moment. “We’ll work something out, okay? Mr Ismail broke the curse the first time, he can do it again.”

Ibrahim moves slowly across the room towards them, thoughtful and considered. He leans back against his desk, arms folded, watching them both. “Where have you seen that type of amulet before, Newt?”

Newt, looking into Percival’s golden eyes, holds the animagus’ gaze for a second longer and then sighs. “I have a friend. A shaman. From up north. I’ve written to her from time to time, about beasts and the like. She’s drawn me pictures of some of the things her people make. Nothing like this though. Innocent things, just decoration mostly.”

Ibrahim is silent for a moment, then asks, “Would she know what this amulet is?”

Newt shrugs. “I have no idea. Maybe?”

“Can you tell us where to find her?”

Newt pushes himself to his feet and looks Ismail straight in the eye. “No, I don’t believe so,” he says.

For a second Ismail holds his gaze, then he smiles. He knows as well as Newt does that Newt is lying. “All right, Mr Scamander, I understand. But you must understand my position here too. The Director of Magical Security has been cursed, and it’s both complex and cyclical. Do you know what that means? Hm? It means that it’s multi-layered. That you can break the first few iterations of its manifestation, but it reweaves itself.  _ It comes back. _ And I believe it’s tethered to a foci, and that foci is the amulet Percival touched. Now, what we could do is destroy the amulet, but I have no idea what repercussions that might have, and right now I’m not willing to take that risk.”

Newt looks down at the jaguar, sitting now, his front claws digging rhythmically into the worn office carpet with little tearing and spiking sounds. He doesn’t know Mr Graves well enough to say if his agitation is due to the curse or due to his own personality, but in all likelihood it’s something of both. He thinks of his shaman friend, and how little trust she has for southerners. How eager she’d been to talk, but how defensive she’d been when speaking of her people, her lands, and the magical society they possess that MACUSA would thoroughly disapprove of. 

“Now I could re-fracture this curse perhaps, Newt, with a few days work. But last time you came to me you’d run the cycle to its end so it was much easier. The true breaking of this curse is going to be in the solving of the amulet’s reason for being.”

Newt risks a brief glance back up at the Assistant Director. His knowledge of curse-breaking is too patchy for this kind of talk.

“Someone knows what this amulet does, and why. Breaking curses isn’t just about brute force, Newt. It’s about understanding why the curse was laid in the first place, because in that you very often find both the how of its casting and the solution to it.”

Newt’s lips thin into a grim, unhappy line, and he looks down at Percival. The Director is staring fixedly across the room at nothing, that rhythmic flexing of his claws still continuing, and a small seed of genuine concern sparks in Newt’s chest. He’d honestly thought bringing him back to Mr Ismail would sort the whole thing out. He’d done it the first time with such ease, although apparently not as well as everyone had thought at the time. How can such practised, powerful wizards not know how to fix this? Briefly, he thinks of Dumbledore, then dismisses the thought. Dumbledore is a long way away and Newt doesn’t really want to tangle with him again, even if his old professor would more than likely go out of his way to offer assistance.

“I can try and make contact with her,” he says softly. “Though I don’t know that she’d help.”

“Can you take us to her?” Ismail asks.

“No. I won’t do that. Your people have a bad history with anyone that doesn’t fit your standards, Mr Ismail, and I’m not willing to subject her to MACUSA’s scrutiny. She’s done nothing wrong, but I’m sure you’d find  _ something. _ ”

To his credit, Ismail merely blinks the accusation away. His smile is gentle, and, Newt thinks, not necessarily one of disagreement. He draws breath to speak, pauses, then begins again. “Would you perhaps consider going to her in person, alone? Perhaps you might take Percival with you?”

Surprised, Newt frowns at him. “I-,” he pauses. He  _ does _ know roughly where she is. At least, he has her owl address, though her replies have always been sporadic and unpredictable. “Together? Me and Mr Graves?”

Ismail nods. “With the amulet. Secured, of course. And with appropriate payment for whatever fee she might charge for her services. We would of course fund that, within reason.”

“Why would you do that?”   
  
The Assistant Director shakes his head slowly at Newt, his expression just a shade away from reproachful. “Because Mr Graves is a very valuable member of MACUSA, but furthermore, he’s a member of the United States magical community, and therefore under our protection. We have a duty to offer whatever assistance we reasonably can.”

Newt thinks of that level of protection, just a little outside what he might expect from the Government back home whose tendency is more towards the  _ you did it, you fix it _ attitude, and wonders how much of this desire to help is down to Percival Graves’ rank. Does it really matter? he thinks to himself. If he can find Atiqtalik then she might be prepared to help. And if nothing else, this amulet belongs to one of her people. Perhaps she might know how to return it to them, even if it’s not from her own group. Still though, travelling the country with Graves in tow, as a jaguar? It’s a big ask.

“I won’t lead you to her,” he repeats, stressing the words and squinting at Ismail. “And he’s not to bother her either. Afterwards I mean. None of you are.”

Ismail’s gaze is mild, and he nods. “Agreed.”

“Your word please, Mr Ismail. As a wizard and as a representative of MACUSA.”

Ismail smiles, just slightly, in acknowledgement. “You have my word, Mr Scamander. Your shaman shall suffer no repercussions due to her choice of action or inaction, and there will be no follow-up made regarding her unless she should come to MACUSA’s attention again in future for unrelated incidents.”

Newt takes a moment to parse this for loopholes, then nods slowly. “I’ll need someone to watch my case,” he says. “Someone who understands beast care preferably. I won’t risk taking it with me.”

Ismail seems surprised, but he raises an eyebrow and dips his chin in agreement. “I assume the Goldsteins can be trusted with this? Although I have some small experience myself, and there are several people from Beast Care that could be drafted in to help.”

“I will need to vet them,” Newt says, thinking of Tina’s likely reaction to being left to care for his case. It’s not the toughest of jobs really, half of it is self-maintaining, made so after years of travelling. But still, someone has to go down and spend time with the beasts every day. He can feel his breath coming shorter at the thought of leaving the case behind, and he closes his eyes against the reaction. It would be a far worse idea to take it halfway across the country on a wild chase that might involve an unstable magical artefact - his real concern here.The mental health of the Unicorns is too fragile right now to risk exposing them to unknown dark magic, and as for the nurseries, no. He can’t allow an item that curses unpredictably to be in close quarters with his charges. It just wouldn’t be responsible, protective box or not. Surprising enough they’re willing to let him go running off with the damned thing in the first place. “I don’t want anyone interfering with the set up down there. It’s very delicate.”

“Of course,” Ismail murmurs.

Newt stays silent, thinking. He knows roughly where Atiqtalik is, and it’s about a fortnight’s train journey from New York, that much he’s picked up from her letters. There’s two or three towns along the way where she plys her trade, and of course she could be at any one of them. Two weeks of train travel. Well, two weeks of cheap train travel. Atiqtalik isn’t the richest person, and she, like him, prefers to travel without drawing attention. “I’ll need a train ticket,” he says. “Two, I suppose.”

“First class, wherever you need,” Ismail replies.

Newt looks down at Graves and the carpet slowly becoming ruined beneath his claws. He reaches down and scratches gently behind the jaguar’s ear, soothing and comforting him without really thinking about it. How in Merlin’s name has he ended up responsible for sorting all this out? Still, it would be cowardly and dishonourable not to offer whatever aid he can. 

“Fine,” he says. “I’ll do it.”

  
  


*

  
  


The train ride to the north is at once both easier and more difficult than Newt imagines it will be. They’re heading cross-country, west and then north, skimming along the border as close as a train can get. Newt knows where they’re going but he’d refused to tell the Assistant Director, just gave him a shrug and a vague ‘ _ west’ _ as his answer. Ismail had been tolerant of his attitude, incredibly and almost improbably so, and Newt’s still not entirely sure how much of what’s going on is common knowledge. How much higher can one go than Graves himself? Picquery? Of course,  _ she’d _ want to know immediately if something had happened to her Director of Magical Security. Again. Perhaps that’s why all this has been so easy so far, why they’ve not encountered any such predictable difficulties as  _ how do you know this shaman? _ and  _ why can’t we go with you? _ or even  _ shut up, sit down, give us the information or we’ll toss a truth serum down your throat. _ Newt’s heard of things like that happening over here, hell there’s rumours of that kind of thing back home. Perhaps none of that is happening because no-one but them knows yet.

Tina had been unsurprisingly less than impressed by his plans for her and his beasts. She’d reacted almost as badly to Newt’s leaving his case with her as he’d expected, which is to say she’d blanched and scolded and given him the look of every older sibling forced to care for younger siblings everywhere (so close to the one that Theseus sometimes wears that for a second he’d been struck cold by it), but she’d given in, just as he’d known she would. It’s for the best, Tina, he’d told her. After the events of last year, and several months to allow his pride to simmer down, he’d managed to admit to himself that bringing his case into New York without suitably maintained locks may not have been the smartest move he’s ever made. And although it’s now secure, at this moment it also contains more beasts than he’d intended it to, none of which should be exposed to any more trauma than absolutely necessary. 

But Tina and Queenie know his beasts, and what’s more they  _ like _ them, which is half the battle. And so he’d spent most of the next day showing them the feeding schedule, which mostly consists of topping up the self-replenishment charms; walking them through the habitat cleansing routines, many of which can be automated by way of a few hygiene cantrips, and given detailed instructions on who needs petting when, where and how. That bit had been the most popular, which hadn’t really surprised him.

Newt had even spoken to the magiveterinarian Ismail had produced, a charming young woman that Newt had immediately forbidden from entering his case. If something goes wrong  _ then _ call on her, he’d informed Tina sternly. Or, even better, send me an owl and I’ll let you know what to do. It’s not that he didn’t like the young woman as such, just that she’d carried the smell of MACUSA bureaucracy on her so thickly that every instinct Newt possessed had immediately combined to shout  _ no! _ in his ear.  

Tina, despite her initial complaints, had risen to the challenge, just as he’d known she would. And she’d done so with such determination to keep everything ticking over as normal that it had been the first hint to Newt that perhaps some kind of cover-up really was afoot. Everyone just a tiny bit too eager to make everything go smoothly. Not that he really cared. The implications and fall-out of any such secretive manoeuvrings is something he’s more than happy to leave squarely in Ismail’s hands. 

It turns out that it’s much harder than even he had anticipated to travel with a non-magical, very obviously predatory beast, and the aurors buzz around making swift preparations and challenging him for his reaction to as many different emergency situations as they can come up with. And they come up with a  _ lot _ . The main gist of their concerns is that Newt keep Percival both close and secret. They mustn’t be detained because then they might be separated, in fact they mustn’t be spotted  _ at all _ because magical or not someone wandering around with a jaguar at their heels is going to draw some very unwelcome attention. Newt finds their fussing completely exhausting and somewhat patronising. Honestly, you’d think he’d never set foot outside his house before the way they go on.  

Even travelling first class on MACUSA’s dime, which will get them a private room on one of the carriages all to themselves, the aurors predict difficulties. They devote an entire afternoon to going over what facilities will be available to them, how likely they are to be disturbed, and what supplies they need to pack in the travel-case they’re going to provide. Some of them attempt to speak to the Director, but Newt quickly puts himself between them, still seeing all the signs of deep distress conveyed in jaguar body language, and they quickly turn their attention on him instead.

That first night and much of the day after Percival is distracted and off-colour. He paces restlessly, shaking his head as though to clear his ears, and often when Newt or Ismail tries to get his attention they have to make more than one attempt before he responds. Ismail, equanimous as ever, simply repeats himself until Graves responds, but Newt suspects the man of being deeply concerned despite his patience. His gaze lingers just a little too long sometimes, and his smile doesn’t always reach his eyes. 

Finally, everything is as prepared as it can be, and Newt goes down into his case for one last check, before Queenie chases him out of the apartment and on his way. Ismail comes with them to the platform on the evening they leave, holding around them the type of  _ notice-me-not _ charm that’s more like a hard line invisibility spell than the more limited version Newt can cast. It surprises Newt just how casually fluent with such magic the man is, but then he reminds himself that there’s a  _ reason _ he’s risen so high in the ranks and cautions himself all over again to be careful. The tiny little hand mirror that will allow him to speak directly to the Assistant Director is burning a hole in his jacket pocket, and Newt knows enough about such artefacts to know you can scry them from afar if they’ve been correctly primed. He fully intends to keep the damned thing locked in the suitcase they’ve given him and take it out only in the direst of circumstances.

Ismail sees them to the station and then on board the largest train the magizoologist has ever seen, all gleaming glass and painted finery. Still, when Ismail puts a hand around the edge of the carriage door just as Newt’s about to pull it closed, he’s not even surprised by the quiet insistence in the senior auror’s voice as he invites Newt to  _ stay in touch _ . It’s velvet-covered steel with all the subtlety thereof, and Newt takes note of it, not even embarrassed by how cowed he feels.

Once they’re underway, Newt draws the curtains across the windows to the corridor beyond and settles himself into the corner to stare out at the passing city. Graves huddles in the space between the richly-appointed beds, tense and unhappy, still staring fixedly at nothing much at all. Even when the ticket collector comes past to check Newt’s ticket he doesn’t stir much, only moving as far as is necessary to be out of the man’s direct line of sight. Afterwards, Newt returns to the chair by the window and shifts his new case around. Provided by MACUSA, it’s a smart, black travelling case a little bigger on the inside than the outside suggests, enough to contain food to feed a jaguar, a few emergency supplies, with a rune-marked compartment sufficiently sized to secure a dangerous artefact in its lead box. He looks up at Graves, huddled back against the foot of the bed and wonders what to do with him.

“It’s very smart in here,” he offers after a moment. “The trains back home aren’t like this.” 

It’s true as far as Newt’s concerned, but then Newt doesn’t normally take the muggle train. Travelling first class on one of these is quite unlike anything Newt’s ever before experienced, even taking into account the Hogwarts Express. The train has a dining carriage and a smoking room, all outfitted with plush armchairs as though they’re in someone’s strangely proportioned mansion house. There’s even one of those muggle music machines in the sitting area outside. It’s all very appealing, and were he not travelling with a beast in tow Newt would be quite eager to go out and experience it all for himself. As it is, he’s decided to stay in their private sleeper cabin with Percival on the off chance the man has sudden need of him. Even so, the little cabin is plushly appointed, with two neatly made up beds and a comfortable settee along the wall facing them, making it hardly a chore to be in here. 

“Would you like something to eat?” Newt offers, still waiting for a reaction. He’s not entirely sure what’s gotten into Graves. Of course, being turned back to your animagus form against your will is less than ideal, but there’s something else about his behaviour that Newt finds troubling. Knowing that sometimes the best way to treat a person in crisis is to just get on with it, he snaps open the case, reaches in and pulls out a small package of fresh meat. The cooling charms on it bite at his fingers and he clears these with a wave of his wand, before spreading the brown paper wide and taking it over for his companion to inspect. 

He places it beneath Percival’s nose, and after a second the jaguar looks down, sniffing softly at the chopped liver. Newt crouches next to him, and it’s the simplest thing to draw his attention with a hand on the back of his neck. Graves is warm, the hard bunch of muscle beneath Newt’s palm taut with tension as he turns his head to look at what Newt’s doing. Newt lets his hand drop away as those golden eyes fix on his, and says, “You should eat something. It might not make everything better, but it’ll certainly help in the long run.”

After a moment Percival pushes himself upright and, sniffing delicately at the meat, begins to eat. Newt leaves him to it, searching out something to fill with water, until eventually he upturns the fruit bowl and fills it up from the jug on the side, amazed all the while by the amenities on offer. Maybe he’ll start travelling first class in future after all. He sets the bowl down in the corner next to Percival and then returns to the settee. He thinks to read, but then another idea strikes him, and pulling out his notebook he begins to chronicle everything he’s learned so far about animagi, or at least, about one animagus in particular.

Eventually, sated, Graves comes over and lies down on the floor next to his feet, and the two of them remain that way in companionable silence until New York slides away and is left far behind.

 

*

 

Percival is lost in a haze of cold winds and the swell and fall of the ocean. He lies in the shallows, listening to the ice crack around him as it pushes up against the beach, and somehow he’s in the water even as the ice packs tight against the shore. He lies with his face half-submerged, yet his breath flows freely and he does not drown. The cold is all-encompassing but he is far past the point of shivering now. Somewhere high overhead he can hear a bird he doesn’t recognise calling as it dives and wheels.

He wakes suddenly to the slow rock of the sleeper carriage, and lifts his head to look around. Newt is a huddled form on one of the beds, his back to the wall. In the light of the single electric lamp left burning he looks peaceful and deeply asleep. Graves sniffs the air, catching the scent of food drifting along from the dining car, and hearing the low murmur of human voices. A woman’s laughter rises sharply and then silences just as quickly. He can smell oil and smoke, the black scents of no-maj industry. Rising to his feet he stretches, the dream already fading. As he has done every hour or so, and each time he wakes, he tests the pull of his magic. Nothing. Where he should feel the familiar swell of his power he feels only a silence that makes him want to snarl, to snap and bite at something unseen that’s stolen it away from him. Taking a breath he flexes his claws and turns a circle in the small space, wanting to move, to  _ run _ . Perhaps just to pace away his anxiety. Despite the opulence of their cabin there’s no room to do any such thing.

They’ve been two days on the rails now, and in that time Percival has been sick with curse-dreams and fraught with anxiety. He knows that he’s not coping particularly well with events, and that Newt has surely caught on to this, but he’s been unable to bring himself under control. The fear of his predicament has him in its grip, and no amount of self-control is helping him to push it down. He wonders if he would have felt this way the first time he was afflicted and if the only reason it hadn’t been so bad was because of Newt’s enforced healing sleep. A part of it he knows is due to his own anxiety. The fear of being trapped like this no longer seems entirely unreasonable. Ismail and Okafor, two of the subtlest curse-breakers he knows, seem unable and unwilling to risk breaking the curse again, refracturing it as they’d put it, and that alone drives a shard of fear deep into his heart. 

He turns another circle then stops, looking up at Newt, who lies still, deep in sleep. The man has been a calm, mostly silent companion so far, not quite the busy, chattery man that Graves so misses. He supposes that he’s still in trouble with him, probably more so now that he’s dragged him even deeper into this predicament. And of course he’ll be missing his beasts, of that much Percival is certain. He’s not seen Newt’s case for the past two days, although it had taken him a day to come sufficiently out of his daze to notice it gone. Left back with MACUSA for safety he supposes, and suspects that this loss will be another mark against him in the long run. It’s going to be quite a tally by the end of this, Percival acknowledges, turning away with a frustrated huff of air.

He wishes that he’d been able to pay more attention while they were still within the confines of the Woolworth Building. He remembers dinner at the Twenty-Twenty-One, and talking to Newt afterwards, feeling too hot and then too cold, and then-, yes, he remembers changing and the shocking horror of being unable to do anything about it. After that there are flashes of memory; he’s certain he’d been more aware at the time, but now he feels muddled and unsure of it all. He remembers being back in Ismail’s office, waiting as he and Okafor looked him over. There had been others present too, but for the life of him he can’t remember who. Ismail will have dealt with that, he’s certain. After that he remembers being on the train, and dreaming, and the ocean, deep-cold and filled with a bitter wind that cuts straight in over the floes to breathe out across the tundra in crystals of ice. Shaking his head to clear the vision, he looks around himself. 

For the first time since the club he’s feeling properly awake and aware again. His magic may be silent, but at least his mind feels as though it’s working once more. They’re on a train, that much is clear from the sight and sounds around him. First class, private cabin, Pullman’s company from what the decor implies. He wonders who’s paying for this - not Newt, surely? He’ll have to reimburse him later if that’s the case. But it begs the question - why are they here? Percival frowns to himself, trying to remember what chain of events had led to this, what logic. He can’t recall a struggle or any impression of subterfuge of any kind, so clearly Newt hasn’t stolen him away for some unknown reason, though why he’d do that in the first place Percival couldn’t say. A brief flash of Ismail’s face at the door to the carriage, looking in on him, passes through his mind and he thinks  _ no, we came on purpose.  _ But why?

Turning back to the beds, Percival puts his forepaws on the edge of the bunk and pushes his nose against Newt’s face, breathing in the scent of him. He can smell dinner on his breath, something unappetizingly alcoholic and meaty that has no appeal whatsoever to his jaguar palate, and he huffs the scent of it from his nostrils. His breath on Newt’s face makes the man wrinkle his nose and sniff, and Percival bumps his cheek with his muzzle to wake him further. Newt startles awake, swiping at him reflexively with his forearm. “Bloody hell, what-?”

_ Get up _ , Percival growls at him.  _ I need to know where we are. _

Newt pushes himself up onto one elbow, fending Percival off with a palm to his face. “Get off, what’s wrong? Is something wrong?”

Percival lets himself drop back down to the floor, backing away into a sitting position, his eyes on Newt.  _ Talk to me, _ he thinks.  _ Tell me what’s going on. _

Newt sits up in bed staring at him, and Graves adds  _ please _ to the end of this thought, almost in despair. He knows Newt can’t read his mind, or understand his voice, but the man has shown an uncanny level of insight in the past. 

“I’m not sure what you want,” Newt says slowly, drawing the covers up around himself as he shifts into a more comfortable position. “Hungry? ...no? You need to pee? No, okay. Sick?”

Graves holds his gaze and wishes they’d come up with a code beforehand. But why would they have done? He’d never intended to get back in this position ever again. The best he can do is not let go of Newt’s gaze until the man comes close to the topic he wants to discuss. Newt sighs and runs a hand through his untidy mop of hair. He could be frustrated or irritated perhaps, it’s hard for Percival to tell. The subtleties of human expression are largely lost on him in this form, much to his frustration. 

“We’ll be in town tomorrow,” Newt says. “The first one anyway. I don’t know that she’ll be there. She travels too much, I think. I mean, I don’t really know. We only exchanged a few letters really.”

Graves’ ears perk up as a memory stirs. He pauses, trying to catch the tail-end of the errant thought, chasing it down but unable to pin it. Something about a shaman? He gives Newt a little grunt of encouragement, and Newt looks at him. “Just things for my book,” he says, and even in this form Graves knows he’s hedging. He makes another sound, a low half-moan that he tries to keep away from a snarl. He knows only too well from dealing with Ismail how easily the human ear misinterprets a jaguar’s vocalisations. Those first few months all those years ago after he’d first completed the ritual to become an animagus had been as frustrating at the time as they amusing in hindsight.

Newt hesitates, then says. “I think she’s probably the only person who might know what to do now. If this magic is from her people, which I guess it is. I mean, the amulet…” He trails off and Percival blinks, thinking about it. The amulet, yes. Ismail had been talking about the amulet. About it being the curse foci, and, yes, cyclical. He closes his eyes; it’s coming back to him now. A cyclical curse tied to a foci, possibly reflective, perhaps factor-dependant,  _ definitely  _ unbound. Percival Graves may not be the best curse-breaker in MACUSA, but he knows the theory backwards. It would make sense to return to the creator of the amulet, where possible, or at least to a local practitioner of the curse-form in order to correctly and fully remove it. Never shatter a curse if you can solve it first, he’d always been taught. Sometimes the damage from brute-forcing a curse far outstrips the effects of the curse itself. 

He opens his eyes and looks up at Newt. The man is staring back at him, his hands toying with the edge of the bedsheets. “We’ll figure something out,” Newt says. “You shouldn’t worry about it. I mean, if this doesn’t work, we still have options. I have...other contacts. Other people who might be able to help us before, I don’t know, before you have to, uhm, go public or whatever. It’ll be okay.”

Unexpectedly touched by Newt’s concern, Percival lets out a long breath. He looks down at the plush red and gold carpet beneath his paws and thinks to himself that he’ll owe Newt more than a single dinner once all this is over. 

“You should get some rest,” Newt says softly. “I can put the gramophone on for you if you’re bored. I think I can work out how to use it.”

They do that, Newt padding out to the shared sitting area in his pyjamas to fiddle with the muggle machine. The sleeping cabin they share the area with is currently vacant, either because MACUSA bought the both of them or simply through luck, and so there’s never been a need to be wary of its occupants. Even so, once Newt has the gramophone playing softly, Percival remains hidden in their cabin. Newt leaves the door ajar for him so he can hear better, and goes back to bed, leaving Percival to sit by the door, peering out into the glow of the room beyond. 

Eventually, Percival moves back alongside the bed and settles there, his chin resting on his folded forepaws, listening to the scratch of the gramophone and the rhythmic rattle of the train as it speeds them through the night.

  
  


*

 

It’s a clear, crisp morning when they make their first stop. Here snow is still piled high across the landscape, and the air is cold enough to warrant the heating charms Newt has running in his coat. He’s spent the last half hour as they drew up to the small town nervously prepping himself to cast the charms necessary to get the Director off the train unnoticed in his jaguar form. The absolute last thing they need is for Newt to leave him behind in the sleeper cabin and for him to be discovered in his absence, or, worse, for Newt to somehow miss the train and the pair of them be separated. 

Picking up the unfamiliar MACUSA case, Newt hefts it nervously, rolling his wand distractedly between the fingers of his free hand. It’s one thing to carry beasts concealed in his case, quite another to walk them openly through the middle of a town. Next to him Percival presses close, and the warmth of him through the material of his trousers is quite surprising. He’s a big, solid weight against Newt’s leg, looking up at him with calm golden eyes. “Although you probably don’t believe me, I’m not actually used to this sort of thing,” Newt tells him apologetically. 

The train begins to slow to a halt, and drawing in a breath, Newt flicks his wand in the necessary pattern to evoke the  _ notice-me-not _ charm. It’s a subtly different form than the one he’s used to, something a little more layered, the spell pulling deeper on his resources and concentration both. Ismail had shown it to him, making him run through the movements and the whispered vocalisation until Newt’s head had quite hurt from the effort. Still, it’s a useful trick he intends to file away for the future, and one which is absolutely necessary now.

As soon as they’re able, Newt opens the door of the cabin on to the platform, and with Percival pressed close at his heels, threads them away through the crowds and out towards the station exit. The station is larger than he’d expected, and it takes them quite a while to make their way out, allowing other people to go first in case they accidentally bump up against a jaguar and turn too much attention to working out what they’d touched. Newt holds the spell in place as best he can, aware that it’s supposed to be something a wizard runs as a background enchantment whilst doing something else, and finds himself once more impressed by the stamina of the aurors that must use these charms regularly. 

Finally, they find themselves free of the station, and Newt walks them down the road, the occasional car and truck passing them by on its way to or from greeting the newly arrived train. They walk until they reach the end of the line of carriages and then Newt cuts them quickly across the tracks behind. There’s a forest on the far side of the tracks and they slog their way through the snow to reach it, pushing with some difficulty through the mounds of snow flung aside by the snow plough that must have been making regular trips along the line. Eventually, they reach the treeline, and with some relief Newt lets the spell drop. “Bloody hell,” he whispers, a little light-headed from the effort of holding it in place. Since no-one has raised any alarm it had clearly been successful, but if he wants to use it in future he’s going to have to practise. 

Percival is looking up at him, and he makes a soft grunt of what Newt supposes is query. “I’m all right,” he says, touching the tips of his fingers to the jaguar’s shoulders. “Just not used to that spell. Right. You need to stay here somewhere, out of sight. I’ll come back to, well, here actually, right here, as soon as possible and pick you up. The train doesn’t leave until seven, so there’s plenty of time for me to get into town and have a look round. Hopefully I’ll find her today. If not, well, I guess we carry on.”

He leaves Percival in the shelter of the trees, a shadow that fades into darkness, and heads on into town. 

The town itself is relatively small, built up around a mining community whose mines have long since run dry. The people of the town have turned to logging instead, which has helped keep the community afloat. Newt makes his way down the main street, looking for the likely places that Atiqtalik might frequent. She plys her trade in bars and hardware stores as far as he knows, selling tools she’s forged from magic, and minor charms for healing and luck. The tools are magically inert, but the charms aren’t, and her trade is both dangerous and highly illegal if the wrong people find out or certain groups take a dislike to what she does. It’s part of why Newt is so reluctant to tell MACUSA who she is or where she is; if they knew half the things Atiqtalik got up to they’d drag her away in chains immediately.

He spends a long morning just hanging around, checking in the town’s two not-bars to see if she’s present, and, finding no-one that looks anything like he’d imagined her to be, goes on his way. It’s strange to be in muggle pubs where food and water’s the only fare on offer, although Newt’s no fool. He knows full well that saying the right words will likely open up other options. He doesn’t try, unwilling to bring attention to himself. He eats lunch in one of them, knowing that it’s more likely he’ll see her come back into town with the rest of the menfolk when the working day’s over. As he understands it from her letters she spends a lot of time out in the forests during the day, or sometimes doing the menfolk’s work off the back of her outsider status and sheer attitude. If she’s here then she’ll be well known enough as an oddity that uncovering word of her shouldn’t be hard.

In the end he finds out from the owner of the hardware store that there is an Inuit woman who comes round sometimes, but that he’s not seen her in a while. When pressed, all he can say is that she might be in town, she might not, and that she’ll be at the bar on Main Street tonight if so. Newt spends the rest of the day holed up in the corner of said bar making notes in his field diary, waiting for the day to end.

Atiqtalik doesn’t turn up that night. Asking around a little when the men come back helps him find out that she’s not been seen in some weeks. “Further on up the track,” he’s told, which simply means they’re going to have to carry on to the next town and hope for the best. Newt eats an early evening meal then packs up his notepad into his small suitcase and heads back out into the bitter cold of the already darkening outside world. He trudges down Main Street, and then cuts through one of the side-streets that will take him to the edge of town, and bring him out on the far side of the train station. Rather than at the place he crossed this morning he intends to make his way to a less conspicuous spot much further down the tracks before casting up the  _ notice-me-not _ . Hours later and he’s still got a slight headache lingering from the last time he cast it. Really, it’s far too draining for everyday use.

Keeping his coat clutched tight around him against the cold he makes his way through the back roads and down a set of quiet alleys between the silent warehouses that make up this district of town. Off to his left between the buildings he can see the rise of snow that marks the edge of the railway tracks, and beyond that the dark shadow of the forest. He’s not far from the point at which he intends to leave cover and cross the tracks when he hears someone else in the alley with him. It’s gloomy here, the walls of two dusty warehouses rising high on either side, and Newt looks back over his shoulder with a frown. There’s a man in the alley with him, a big guy with the clothes of a labourer. He’s moving up fast on Newt and Newt knows body language well enough to understand the man means him no good. True to his suspicions, the man has what looks like a wrench in one hand, held close by his thigh, and as he comes closer he brings it further into sight, lifting his chin to look straight into Newt’s eye from beneath his cap. 

“Mm, no, I don’t think so,” Newt says when he sees that look of intent, and pulls out his wand. “ _ Petrificus totalis!” _

The man goes stiff and falls to the floor like a felled tree, and Newt takes a step back to look down at him. Not ideal. With a frown he looks around; the alley has some crates stacked along one side, he could hide the man there, propped up out of sight. The spell will wear off in a few minutes, just enough time to obliviate and put the man into a light sleep. Glancing around, Newt drags him over to the crates, feet slipping a little on the ice, and casts a hasty sleep-obliviate combination on him. 

_ That should do it, _ he thinks, and he’s so busy concentrating on making sure the man is at least mostly propped up out of the snow that he doesn’t notice the second person coming up behind him. The first he knows that he’s not alone is the tremendously hard impact on the back of his skull, and then he’s not aware of anything at all.

  
  


*

 

When Newt wakes it’s to the deep cold of the icy stone beneath his back. There’s a rushing sound, as of the wind in the distance, and more pressing, the incredible pain of someone pulling at the wound on the back of his head. Newt moans, and flails with his arm, trying to shove whatever weight is holding him down off and away. His hand encounters something both hard and soft, a confusing shape that he can’t understand, and the dragging pull on his hair stops, although the pain doesn’t. He cracks his eyes open and the shadows move above him. His head is a piercing throb of pain, and he can’t seem to focus his eyes properly. It takes him a few moments to make sense of the shape before him, and recognise the sound and the smell of it. 

“Nox,” he mumbles, “Sorry.” Reaching awkwardly, he hooks an arm around the beast’s neck and tries to steady himself on him. It doesn’t work because he’s already on his back, he’d just not realised it. “What happened…?”   
  
Nox hooks his teeth into the front of Newt’s coat and begins to pull him upright into a sitting position. Newt groans as the movement makes the pain in his head crescendo sharply, but the jaguar is having none of his struggles. He growls sharply, and Newt clutches at the back of his skull, feeling his fingers come away sticky with something more viscous than snowmelt. He blinks blearily around at the alley, trying to work out what happened, and sees the snow red with the dull gleam of blood. For a second he thinks it’s his, but he’s too far away from it for that to be the case and surely there’s far too much of it. The alley is otherwise empty. 

Nox is tugging hard at him again, his teeth latched on to Newt’s coat, the force of it pulling Newt along a little way. His anxiety is infectious, and scrambling, the movement making the pain in his head burn brighter, Newt pushes himself awkwardly to his feet. His eyes alight on the MACUSA case lying a little distance away in the snow, his wand next to it. Feeling like he’s about to lose his dinner he staggers over to them and scoops them up out of the snow, trying to remember what the hell just happened. Someone had...someone had, what? Jumped him? He can’t  _ remember. _

Nox has hold of the edge of his coat again, tugging him so hard Newt almost falls to his knees. He takes a few steps after him, wondering how they’re here and how Nox is here too, and something in him says  _ not Nox, no, remember? _ Not really, he thinks back. Still, Newt trusts his beasts and Nox is one of his and they’ve not let him down yet.

With difficulty he lets Nox drag him out from between the warehouses, leaving the bloodied snow behind, and into the darkening open space beyond. The train tracks are a somehow familiar sight to Newt as he stumbles across them, one hand reaching down to the jaguar’s shoulder for support, the angle of his drunken lurching making their progress strange and slow. There’s a train in the distance, standing silent but lit on one of the empty tracks, and something in Newt tells him they ought to go back to it. Nox however, is relentless. As soon as Newt pauses he puts his teeth into the cuff of his coat and tugs him onwards, circling round behind him to bully him forwards whenever he starts to slow again. 

By the time they come up on the tree-line Newt can feel some of his memories sliding back into place. He’d been going back to the train and someone had jumped him. He’d been going back to fetch Graves. The jaguar, yes. Coming up on the first of the trees, Newt stumbles up hard against it, and bracing himself against its icy trunk has to pause and puke up his dinner. Graves stands off to one side, breath steaming in the cold night air as he watches. 

Newt leans against the tree, feeling his head swim dangerously, his limbs trembling, and thinks to himself  _ this isn’t good. _ He knows about head injuries, and he knows he needs to do something soon. Graves is looking back towards the town, his ears pricked up as he listens, and he makes an unhappy growling noise then reaches for the edge of Newt’s coat to tug him onwards deeper into the forest.

“I need to-,” Newt says, unable to quite find the words. He needs to sit down and open his case and get the medical kit he’s brought with him. “Nox...Graves, I need to…”

Graves half drags him through the snow, pulling him ever deeper into the forest. It quickly becomes dark enough that Newt can barely see, and he’s forced to rely on the jaguar’s guidance. Graves makes him scramble onwards for another ten minutes, until Newt, blinded by more than just the gloom beneath the trees, goes to his knees and refuses to go further. “I can’t,” he says. Graves stares at him, then around, and then starts to dig away at the snow beneath one of the nearby trees. Newt can hear the patter of snow and the rasp of his breath as he digs. He kneels in the ice, trying to keep his stomach under control, just breathing through the throbbing in his head. Strangely, he feels quite warm, and that too can’t be a good sign.

As soon as Newt has allowed his eyes to close, Graves is back at his side, biting hard on his shoulder to get his attention. “Damn, sorry,” Newt mutters. He’d not meant to let himself drift. Drifting is bad, he knows. He needs to get into the case and get the medkit, but Graves has hold of him again, dragging him forward and under the tree. It’s rough going in, the low-hanging boughs sharp against his body, catching at his hair and making the wound on his head shriek. Newt moans, but Graves is persistent, using his enormous strength to haul him bodily beneath the tree and into the shelter beneath its branches. He’s gone and then back in a second, and Newt can hear something thumping down next to him. It’s dark under here, but warmer than outside, the little den a natural cave where the snow has piled up around the gap made beneath the tree’s sagging boughs. He can hear Graves pushing snow back into place to seal up the entrance, and lets himself sit back on the snow, his legs feeling too wobbly to support him. The top of his head brushes the underside of the branches, and he yelps at the pain, then gasps as his instinctive jerk away sends agony down his neck. Miserably he hunches in the darkness, feeling the pain throb in his skull and feeling his stomach contemplate emptying itself again.

A bite to his upper arm brings him out of his daze. Graves is pushing the cold, hard box of the suitcase up against his legs, growling persistently, and Newt grunts an acknowledgement. It takes him several long seconds of fumbling before he can drag the latches open and reach inside. It’s too dark to see, so he feels his way around the inside of the case, his pounding head making lights appear that he knows aren’t there. He finds the candle only after he’s fumbled for longer than it should take, and even then it’s by accident - he’d entirely forgotten that it was there. So focussed on getting his medikit as he was, the rest of the equipment the aurors had packed for him had entirely slipped his mind. MACUSA had prepped him for an emergency, equipping the case with rations for both himself and Graves, a small survival kit and several pouches of various monies, both wizarding and no-maj. It’s the survival kit his groping has uncovered, part of it at least. The candle intended for a ritual rather than a light-source, though right now it’ll do just fine. They’ve even included matches, tied to the side.

In the flickering light Graves’ eyes gleam, and Newt can see him licking his lips anxiously. He watches in silence as Newt painfully pulls out his battered field medikit, unrolling the flap of leather and selecting one of the small potions bottles strapped within. Newt has spent long enough travelling and working in the field alone to be cognisant of the need to plan for emergencies. He has all the basics in this kit, and some of the more interesting ones too. Broad-use antivenoms, painkillers, uppers, downers and these two healing draughts he keeps for situations just like this. Newt knows far better than to attempt any healing magic on himself while suffering from a head injury, no matter how much he thinks he’ll be fine doing it, it really isn’t worth the risk. The money and time that had gone into preparing these draughts is irrelevant - they’re worth every Knut, and times like this are precisely why he carries them.

The potion is surprisingly sweet, with an aftertaste of mint, and Newt drinks the whole lot down in one go, then sits quietly for a second with his eyes closed. The potion won’t heal him instantly, he certainly doesn’t have the skill  _ or _ the money to create something like that, but it’ll stop any damage from getting worse, and over the next few hours it’ll work on healing him up. Even so he’ll have to take the other one tomorrow, just to be safe. Newt’s confidence is born from past experience; he’s used this brew before in some incredibly dire situations, ones that he’s never really told anyone about, and he knows full well that he can trust them.

He opens his eyes to find the jaguar watching him silently. Graves’ golden eyes are serious, his gaze intent. “I’ll be fine,” Newt tells him. “Just need to give this a few hours to work.” He shakes his head, feeling the potion starting to fuzz his senses already, and regrets it immediately as pain shoots through his skull. “Oh, Merlin. What the hell happened back there?”

Graves sighs and gets to his feet. There’s not that much room under the tree branches, and he’s not a small animal, so when he pushes past Newt to look at the back of his head he sends a heavy patter of snow falling down on top of them both. Newt holds still, wincing as the jaguar sniffs at his wound, giving it a careful lick that makes Newt yelp. “Argh, leave it be! Let the potion sort it,  _ please. _ ”

The jolt of pain the touch sent through Newt’s head had brought tears to his eyes, and he wipes these away, lifting his arm to fend Graves off. He feels sick and cold and his entire jaw is hurting now with radiating pain. Worse, he’s sat in a melting pile of snow under a tree in a dark forest, and although it’s certainly not the worst situation he’s ever been in, he’s not sure why they’re having to endure it. He thinks back to the alley and the blood on the snow.  _ Oh. _

“Did you kill them?” Newt asks, horrified, then stops. “No, of course not. No body.”

Behind him Graves snorts, and he feels the puff of his breath on the back of his neck. His thoughts are still fractured, and he’s having a hard time making sense of the timeline of events, but something that’s been bothering him since before they entered the forest now reveals itself with perfect clarity. “We’re going to miss the train!”

Graves has a heavy paw on his shoulder at once, the enormous, yellow claws digging in just enough to get a grip on the fabric.  _ Stay still _ is the clear message. Newt blinks against the sick feeling the exclamation had provoked in his stomach and closes his eyes. “Fine,” he breathes. “Fine. We can get tomorrow’s, or, or whatever. However. I don’t know. Nox, Graves, I’m really tired. This potion-...”

It’s a normal side-effect of any healing potion, the desire to sleep, but still the sheer impetus of it takes him by surprise. If he had no experience with this he might be alarmed. As it is he pushes his fingers into the thin layer of snow that’s drifted in under the branches and feels his nail scrape on the cold, hard ground below. Despite the cover it’s still bitterly cold out here, and the heating charms in his coat are all that’s keeping him going.

Graves’ paw falls from his shoulder, and he reaches round Newt, puffing breath against the candle until it extinguishes, leaving a twist of smoke scent on the air. Newt feels himself being pushed slowly but inexorably down, and unable to resist the jaguar’s great weight he goes over on his side with a low groan. Graves settles next to him, then shuffles closer when Newt simply lies there, too woozy and hurting to respond. In the cold the animagus’ body is a solid, constant source of warmth. Newt can feel the hot snuff of his breath against his face, and for a while he just drifts. Then Graves nudges him with his muzzle, huffing heat and damp across his cheek, and Newt allows himself to be pressed up against the jaguar’s flank as the beast shuffles closer. Graves is a furnace of heat in the darkness, and without being consciously aware of it Newt lets his head be cushioned against the jaguar's foreleg. 

He falls asleep with his fingers threaded into the jaguar’s thick fur, Graves’ tail draped across his hip, and the deep thump of his heart beating a soothing rhythm in the dark.

  
  


*

 

In the daylight the forest comes alive with the cries of the birds and the soft drip of slowly melting snow. Newt wakes up gradually, tasting the lingering sweetness of the potion in his mouth and feeling the drag in his muscles that tells him it’s worked. For a minute he just drifts, counting his limbs and feeling for the pain that had cracked through his skull last night. There’s nothing but the warmth of his coat and the breathing of the creature beside him. Newt shifts slightly, his cheek pressed against the material of-, he’s not sure. His eyes blink open, and he looks up into Percival Graves’ face. The man is looking back at him, his mouth pulled down at the corner in an expression that’s somewhere between concern and apprehension.

“You’re-,” Newt says.

“I think it’s something to do with it tripping my magical reserves,” Percival says miserably. He reaches out and rubs a thumb under the curve of Newt’s chin, and Newt feels the tingling heat of healing magic. Percival lets his hand fall back beneath the blanket he’s charmed from somewhere, and Newt follows the movement, looking at the pale fabric as though he’s never seen a blanket before. He realises quite suddenly that the warmth of their den is only in part owed to the heating charms in his coat. An embarrassed sound pushes out of him, and he closes his mouth against it. Graves has cast heating charms on the blanket, and the press of his body along Newt’s is providing the rest of the warmth. “I’m sorry, I didn’t want to wake you. Though I suppose you didn’t notice me change, ah.” Graves sighs, closes his eyes briefly and shakes his head. “It was bitter cold last night and I thought it best if I let the potion do its work. We’ve missed the damned train by a long way regardless.”

“You changed,” Newt repeats.

Graves returns his gaze to Newt’s face, a glance that’s meant to gauge his coherence, then says, “In my sleep.” He seems slightly embarrassed by it, and Newt tilts his head, still confused. Graves frowns at him. “I think you might need that second potion.”

“I’m-, actually,” Newt says, putting a hand to his head. There’s no pain at all and he feels sharper and more alert than perhaps the potion alone could manage. There’s still that drag of healing magic in his muscles though, the drain of fueling the spell with his body’s reserves. Still, he feels better than just a potion should be able to manage. “Did you…?”

“A little,” Graves confirms, turning onto his side to pull the suitcase closer. Newt watches him flip it open, thinking that the man’s complete disregard for the impropriety of their situation is going a long way towards stopping him from making a fool of himself. It’s much easier not to be embarrassed if the other person so obviously isn’t.

Graves digs the second potion out of Newt’s medkit and hands it to him. Newt grimaces. “It’s going to wipe me out.”

“You can sleep on the train.”

“Are we-?” Newt breaks the seal on the potion with his thumbnail, then pauses suddenly. “What in Merlin’s name happened last night? I remember one bloke in the alley, then, there must have been another one. And then you were there!”

“There was, and I was.” Percival grimaces and then shrugs, pulling the blanket further up around his neck. “I’d been in the forest all day. I was cold, so I started moving around. When dusk started to fall I crossed over the tracks - there was no-one around.”

“Someone might have spotted you,” Newt says accusingly, annoyed that he’d spent so much time and effort concealing them only for Percival to completely disregard all precautions.

“No-one saw me,” Graves replies smoothly. “And if I hadn’t been in the vicinity that thief would have made off with everything you had on you, including the case.”

“What did you do to him?” Newt asks softly, popping the lid on the potion and taking a sip.

Graves raises his eyebrows briefly, unconcerned by Newt’s suspicion. “I dealt with him. But he and his friend had already run off by the time you woke up. You were out for a full minute, I was starting to think I was going to have to drag you away.”

Newt gulps the last of the potion back and winces at the taste. He must be close to better since it’s started to taste sickly sweet rather than pleasant. “You could have taken the case and left me. Someone would have found me.”

Graves gives him a disapproving look, shakes his head once and doesn’t deign to answer that. “I don’t know how much of an alarm they raised, I heard some shouting as we were crossing the tracks. The last thing we needed was a posse on our tails, and you were in no condition to sneak us both back on the train in time.”

Newt glances around at the shadowy interior of their snow den, noting the daylight that’s filtering down through the tree’s branches. “What time is it?”

“Nearly ten. You’ve slept for almost fifteen hours.”

Newt blinks. “Must have needed it.”

“How do you feel now?”

“Better; I probably didn’t need the second dose,” he admits, but Graves shakes his head. 

“You may think that but we can’t risk you relapsing. Head wounds are strange.”

Newt knows that for sure, and he hums an agreement. The second potion is sitting lightly in his belly, and he can feel it starting to spread warmth through him from the inside. It’s from a powerful brew, and Newt is already feeling the ache of hunger left over from the first one’s greedy draining of his body’s resources. He’ll be ravenous in a few hours. “What do you think happened with the curse?” he asks slowly, relaxing into the pleasant fuzziness the potion floods through his body.

“Which bit?” Graves replies, watching the potion’s effects manifest in Newt’s half-closed eyes and parted lips. Realising what he’s doing, Newt schools his features into something less blissed out, embarrassed to be caught drifting like that.

“Well, all of it really. Why did you transform and, I suppose more importantly, why did you transform back? I don’t suppose the curse is broken, is it?” Newt asks hopefully, already knowing the likely answer to that.

Graves huffs dark amusement, and shakes his head. “We should be so fortunate. I don’t know what set it off again, but it’s tied to something, and not just the amulet. Moon phases, tides, creator’s whim - Morgana only knows. Ismail cut some of the threads of it the first time round, clearly. I mean, this abatement is far quicker than the last time. But no, no I don’t believe it’s broken. Just in recession.”

Newt sighs and lies back down, the movement putting some space between them, allowing the cold morning air to creep in below the blanket. “So we still need to find Atiqtalik,” he says.

“I’m afraid so,” Graves nods.

A thought occurs to Newt and he frowns. “How are you feeling otherwise?”

Percival looks around, flicking a sardonic eyebrow at their surroundings. “Cold. Damp. Pissed off. And weak as a goddamned kitten if I’m honest. It was all I could do to make the blanket and help the potion along. I’m sorry, I’d have done more if I could.”

“Hardly,” Newt murmurs. “I should have seen that man coming, I was stupid.”

“Well,” says Graves. “We’re both pretty damned good at that, it seems. Let’s not dwell on it, all right?” He draws in a deep breath, looking Newt over, and Newt, strangely embarrassed by the ease of the other’s man’s attention, feels himself wanting to shrink away. “Now, as much I don’t relish leaving the dubious warmth of this place, we have to get back to town. I’m going to assume you need feeding after downing those, and we need to obtain passage on the next train. They’re fairly regular on that line, so it should just be a case of keeping a low profile until the next one turns up.”

Reminded all over again of the hunger gnawing in his belly, Newt agrees readily enough. “Breakfast would be nice,” he admits. “Though it might be best if I bring something out to you, or maybe we find somewhere that doesn’t mind, uh, pets. Just in case.”

Graves gives him a  _ look _ , and Newt buries his smile behind a dipped chin. They pack up their few items, and together push their way out of their snow den, blinking in the bright morning sunshine. Then, leaning on one another for support, they make their tired way back to town.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you as ever for reading! I hope you're still enjoying and see you next chapter, where there shall be more getting to know each other and further angst of the curse variety. ;]


	11. Cracks in the Ice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As the curse continues to bite, some things at least begin to thaw.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long, I went on holiday for a bit. I always plan to write in the evenings when abroad but it never works - no idea why, the words just won’t come. Anyway, thanks for your patience, bring on the flangst!

Percival wakes up drowning. The roar of the water is thunderous, the pounding of blood in his head a frantic beat that urges him to _breathe now._ But to breathe would be death, and the water has a paralyzing grip on his limbs, so heavy he can't resist-

"Percival! _Percival!_ Mister- _Mister Graves!"_

He comes to gasping, and for a second chokes on air. Newt Scamander has him by the upper arms, his grip so tight it's painful, and he's shaking him with a strength that belies his wiry frame. Percival looks up into his concerned eyes, mind still slipping as it tries to process reality. He's cold, so damned cold- "Newt?" he croaks.

"Yes, that's right. Are you with me?"

"I- I don't know, what-?"

Percival reaches up and grasps at Newt's arms, holding on as the world seems to sway around them. As his tumbling thoughts return to some semblance of order he recognises the confines of their sleeper cabin on the train, the red velvet curtains and the dark wood paneling becoming real and solid before him. Their surfaces gleam with a thin patina of ice, and the window next to the bed where he's lying is patterned with the intricate whorling of freshly formed frost.

"You were dreaming, I think," Newt says, reaching down and turning Percival's head back towards him with a hand beneath his chin. Percival looks up into his eyes and blinks. "Do you know where you are?"

"On the train," Percival says. He's lying on one of the two single beds in their narrow cabin, and Newt is standing in the space between them, leaning over him. The other man's fingers are hot where they grip his chin, and Percival looks around in concern. Why is it so cold in here?

"Has this ever happened before?" Newt asks, and although his tone is mild Percival can still hear concern in it. It's hardly unwarranted. Free of the paralyzing grip of the dream, he can see that the space around him is limned with glittering frost, the physical manifestation of uncontrolled spell drag.

"Is that from me?" Percival asks, aghast, already knowing the answer.

"I'm afraid so," Newt replies. "You were...having a nightmare, I believe. You were, uhm, talking I think, and then you started to get upset, and then, well. I thought it was time to wake you."

"Thank you," Percival mutters, pushing himself upright into a sitting position. Newt keeps a steady grip on him, and Percival realises that he's not yet let go fully himself, one hand still clenched around Newt’s upper arm. The warmth of the other man, and his steadiness, is more reassuring than he'd care to admit. He looks around again and winces. _Children_ manifest their magic like this. Alongside unexpected castings of minor cantrips, manifestation of mystical energy while ill or under stress is another common symptom of an awakening gift. Night terrors has a completely new layer of meaning when it comes to the offspring of magical folk. It's certainly not something a fully functioning adult wizard should experience.

Newt is still looking at him cautiously, and Percival grimaces. "I'm fine," he says. "Sorry, this is- I'm sorry." He forces himself to let go of the other man's arm, running his other hand distractedly through his hair. His fingers come away damp with melting ice crystals.

"How does your magic feel now?" Newt asks carefully.

Percival looks down at his wet fingers, and rubs his hands together to dry them. He can feel his magic banked low deep inside him, a muted glow of embers rather than the scintillating ethereal roar he can usually summon. It's been that way for two days, since they left the forest behind the morning after the failed attempt to mug Newt. "Still weak," he admits. "I suppose this-” he nods towards the rapidly melting ice around him, “-could be in response to that."

Newt bobs his head in response. "Your body trying to replenish its reserves by drawing from the immediate vicinity. Perhaps. Though you didn't draw on me at all."

Percival looks sideways at him in surprise, and shrugs an acknowledgement. "I'll take your word for it," he says slowly.

Newt straightens, finally letting go of Percival's upper arms. Percival can feel him watching as he brushes flakes of ice from his pyjamas. Beneath his scrutiny he feels uncomfortably exposed. This kind of episode is a form of weakness  he's not ready to show in front of anyone, and to be caught in yet another involuntary loss of control is simply mortifying. He's supposed to be an auror first class for Morgana's sake. He continues to brush irritably at his night clothes, taking out his frustration on the evidence of his failing. Of course, circumstances are not entirely normal. There _is_ the curse. Weak excuse though that is too.

"This is getting worse, isn't it?" Newt asks gently.

Percival frowns and swings his legs over the side of the bed. He cannot abide being coddled. "Did I see a towel earlier?" he asks. "Where did that go?"

There's a moment of silence, then Newt sighs softly, and nods. "Over in the small cupboard. Second shelf."

Percival busies himself with drying off his clothes, using his wand and gritting his teeth with the sheer effort it costs him to cast the drying charm. He resolutely ignores what's going on behind him as Newt quietly takes care of the rest of the room with a simple wave of his wand, and afterwards retreats to the sitting area outside to sulk in private.

  


*

  


They reach their next stop the following morning, disembarking in another small town huddled defensively beneath the snow. This one has more life than the last, though Newt couldn't have said why. Whatever the cause it means there's a choice of coffee houses for them to duck into and warm themselves when the cold becomes too biting. Percival finds a corner furthest from the door and mainlines coffee and pastries. Newt watches him from behind the curling steam of his own mug, his expression something bordering on impressed. Carefully he offers up the unfinished half of his pastry, more to see what will happen than actually being done with it. Percival raises an eyebrow to check he's sure, then pulls it across the table and finishes it in two bites.

"How are you feeling?" Newt asks carefully, respect for a healthy show of greed somewhat at war with his concern. Of course, for Percival, it's hardly greed driving him, and Newt is well aware of that.

"Better," Percival replies shortly. "We should find some more substantial food soon though."

Newt nods agreeably enough. Pastries are one thing, a proper meal of bacon and eggs wouldn't go amiss though, and of course propping up Percival's flagging magical reserves with caffeine and sugar will only get them so far. "We'll need to visit the bars and the hardware stores, wherever they are."

"What's she like, this shaman of yours?" Percival asks.

Newt hums and sets down his mug. "I don't know to be honest. I've only ever spoken to her via owl. Everything I've picked up is what she's told me in letters." Catching sight of Percival's lowering brow, Newt shrugs. "I did warn Mr Ismail that this would be a long shot."

Graves lets out a long, slow breath, and Newt winces as he watches the man get a grip on his temper. "I'm sorry," Percival murmurs after a moment. "I thought you knew her better than that. Can we, ah, can we rely on her?"

Newt shrugs. "If she'll talk to us. I mean, I'm fairly certain she'll talk to me once I've introduced myself." He hesitates. "It might be better if you leave the talking up to me though."

Percival gives him a particular look that Newt is rapidly becoming familiar with, and he feels his pride sting a little. He’s had variations of that look off quite enough people now thank you very much - he doesn’t need Percival joining their ranks too. "Whatever happens," he adds archly. "You may want to put your hands in your pockets before anyone else sees them shaking. Perhaps have a nice cup of tea, it can have a very calming effect."

For a second, Percival simply stares at him, then he gives a sharp bark of laughter. "You insolent bastard," he growls, and pours himself another mug of coffee.

By the time they get word of their target, the day is almost done. They've made their way around four different hardware stores, more than they’d ever have credited the place with being able to support, traipsing on foot back and forth across the town, until even Newt is starting to tire. Percival follows along grimly at his side, the sharpness of his dress and the dark look on his face keeping everyone's eyes off them. Even sick and far from home he's a man that commands respect.

They find themselves in a small bar by the middle of the afternoon, ordering food again, only partially as an excuse to be there and primarily to help stave off Percival's growing discomfort. Newt has been keeping a careful eye on him for the last few hours, noting the growing sourness in his expression, and the way he stops more and more often to look into a store front or take in the view, a shallow cover for his flagging energy levels.

They hole up in one corner of the bar’s main room, where they can command a good view of the entire establishment. As Percival eats his way through a generous plate of fish and vegetables, Newt keeps an eye out for anyone that seems a likely match for an Inuit shaman. He wonders again if he should have owled ahead, then discards the idea. The last thing he'd wanted was to use a tracked MACUSA bird, and besides, Atiqtalik's response times to owls have always been less than stellar. He knows for a fact that sometimes even the vaunted magical postbirds have great difficulty in finding her. He sighs, then straightens with a smile as one of the barmaids brings over his dinner. As she sets the plate down before him something catches his eye. It’s the movement of her hands that does it, the swing of her wrist causing a glimmer of colour to flash across highly polished bone, like sunlight across water. A small leather thong with a tiny carved charm attached is wrapped tightly around her small wrist, and he can tell from the play of colours across its surface that it’s something just a little _different_.

Newt keeps the smile on his face as he thanks the woman, then starts on his own food, studiously avoiding Percival's eye. He's not sure the Director had noticed what he has, and he’s got a very strong suspicion that the woman wearing the bracelet is most likely not one of the magical community. This is exactly the kind of thing he’s been trying so hard to shield from MACUSA’s interested gaze, and he curses inwardly that his luck should play out this way. As much as they need some kind of lead in all this, he could very much do without drawing MACUSA’s attention to the practices of some of the less prevalent magical communities.

It takes no small effort of will to eat normally and not simply jump to his feet in immediate pursuit, but Newt forces himself to finish his meal, taking care to keep his gaze away from the woman. Thankfully Percival seems content to sit in tired silence, eyes half-closed - almost dozing, Newt thinks. Finally he finishes up, and, setting down his cutlery, murmurs, "Back in a moment." Percival acknowledges him with a soft, half-asleep grunt, and Newt leaves him to snooze as he makes his way over to the bar.

His suspicions turn out to be correct. The woman, at first smiling a little fixedly in the face of his perceived romantic interest, soon warms to him when he reveals to her that he’s searching for the ‘specialist contact’ who can provide certain items of jewellery, ones that have unique properties. It’s for his...wife, you see. She understands, of course? Newt’s not entirely sure what type of charms Atiqtalik sells, only that she’s mentioned doing so once or twice, although his broad guess proves accurate when the barmaid seems to read into his words something that fits her understanding of the situation. She tells him that Atiqtalik’s not in town any more, having already left a week ago, heading west. If he really wants to find her then he needs to stay on the tracks and get off in Blacksville because that’s usually where she heads from here. Thanking her, Newt heads back to the table.

Percival is leaning back in his chair, head resting against the wall behind, his arms folded across his chest and his eyes closed. Newt looks closely at him as he takes his seat, wondering how deeply asleep he is. The afternoon outside is rapidly fading towards the gloom of dusk, and they probably ought to have sorted out some kind of accomodation by now. There’d been a couple of likely looking places dotted around he’d thought. Perhaps they should try one of those next.

“That woman is a no-maj,” Percival murmurs softly, and as quiet as his voice is, the words still have Newt half jumping out of his skin. He stares at the other man, but Graves doesn’t open his eyes, and for a second Newt blinks, wondering if he’d just dropped the words directly into his head. Uncomfortable, he glances around and doesn’t reply.

Although America has one of the most strictly enforced interpretations of the International Statute of Secrecy, Great Britain is hardly lax in its enforcement either, even if the rules around intermarriage are somewhat less severe. Newt knows this, and he’s lived his entire life abiding by those rules. But at the same time Newt has travelled a very long way in pursuit of his career, across borders and nations, cities and deserts, and to him the answers aren’t always that simple. He’s seen places where the magefolk live side-by-side with muggles and everyone’s better for it. It’s not common, but it’s not that rare either. What goes on far from the cities cannot possibly be expected to adhere to the rules of an entirely different social structure.

Still, what can he do? The woman’s a muggle and Percival has spotted it. Newt’s chances of obliviating that information from the Director’s mind are about as laughable as the likelihood the man will let this drop. And, as much as it annoys Newt to admit it, he’s right. America, like every other nation, has a famously bad history when it comes to muggles and the magical community, and they all have a duty to ensure the safety and secrecy of everyone else remains intact. He tries very hard right then not to think of Jacob.  

“Well, I can hardly accost her in the middle of the barroom and wrestle the thing off her wrist. I don’t think that will go down well with the rest of the patrons. We’ll have to try again tomorrow.” Newt can hear the irritation in his own voice, and knows that he’s coming across poorly. It’s hardly good form to show too much exasperation with such a fundamental aspect of the law right to the face of an auror, and he forces himself to moderate his tone as he continues, “Anyway, we should get a hotel soon. We’re paid up here, and I have a direction to head in now. Tomorrow we’ll need to carry on further down the track to the next town, since she left for there a week ago.”

Percival’s eyes drift open and he regards Newt with an even gaze. Newt smiles at him brightly, then looks away. “Right, come on then. I don’t mean to be rude, but you really are looking like you could do with some more sleep.”

To Newt’s great surprise and honest relief, Percival lets the subject drop, and follows him quietly back out onto the street. They stand carefully on the icy sidewalk, coats pulled tight around their necks, looking around at a town rapidly beginning to wind down for the evening. Newt squints, searching for the sign he’d spotted earlier. They need something small and out of the way, and there’d been a tiny, unassuming guest house down one of the side streets that had looked like exactly the right sort of thing.

“This way, I think,” he says, setting off. Percival follows after a moment, grim-faced and unhappy. “You all right?” Newt asks hesitantly, then double-takes, glancing at him again in consternation. In the dimming light of early evening Percival looks thoroughly exhausted. With a twinge of guilt, Newt realises his co-operation is most likely due to fatigue rather than any inclination towards leniency. “Not far now,” he assures him.

Except when they reach the guest house, Percival simply stands in the street looking from the weather-beaten facade and grimy windows, to the faded card in the doorway that announces vacancies available, and then back to Newt.

“Absolutely not,” he says flatly.

“What’s wrong with it?” Newt asks blankly. The place will be cheap, won’t ask any questions, and they only need it for one night.

Percival grimaces at him in disbelief, then shakes his head. “This way, Scamander. Come on, hurry up. I’m freezing my balls off out here.”

Blinking in confusion, Newt allows himself to be led away, back towards the lights of Main Street.

The hotel that Percival chooses for them is the big, brightly lit affair they’d passed on their way out of the station this morning. It’s an expensive modern setup complete with its own doorman, a gleaming crystal chandelier in the front reception, and an atmosphere dripping with almost comical levels of self-deluded grandeur. It’s strikingly out of place in this small town, and Newt has no idea how on earth the place funds itself on what appears to be a thin trickle of visitors. Nonetheless it takes the muggle money Percival produces from his jacket pocket and doesn’t, despite Newt’s fears, even lift an eyebrow when Percival asks for a double room to serve them both. Muggles are notoriously strange about sleeping habits, Newt is well-aware from his own travels, and one has to be very careful not to step on their sensitive toes or else they can become quite difficult about matters. Still, money eases all moral quandaries, he supposes grimly.

“Are you sure about this?” he asks nervously, as a uniformed porter offers to take his case. “Uh, no, thank you, that’s quite all right.”

“I’m sure that I want a hot shower and an edible evening meal brought up,” Percival replies shortly.

The hot shower he can understand, the idea of even more food is almost laughable though. Newt, edging around the porter, suitcase clutched tight in his hands, scrabbles to follow as his companion heads for the stairs, not even pausing once to look back.

  


*

 

 

Graves drags his fingers through his hair, leaning his head forward until his forehead almost touches the tiles, and lets the hot water cascade down over his shoulders. He’s cold inside; a bone-deep ache, as though the ice of their recent night-time misadventure has seeped into his body and settled there in his ribs and his thighs, and the flesh of his belly. His magic is a dull curl in his abdomen, and it stirs only sluggishly when he reaches for it. This is far worse than the last time, and the chill he feels is not just from the effects of the curse.

It’s been nearly five days now and still all they have of this shaman of Newt’s is a bone charm wrapped around a no-maj’s wrist. It’s an infraction of the law of course, severity dependent on both what the charm does and how much the no-maj knows. He can picture the paperwork now, see the exact form that needs to be filled out, and suddenly he’s full of despair. Merlin, it’s all so fucking pointless sometimes.

_Get a grip,_ he reprimands himself.

Percival’s no fresh-faced fool, straight out of Ilvermorny. He’s been an auror for nearly thirty years now, and spent most of that time at the top of the hierarchy, far enough up to know that not everything’s as black and white as they like to have people think. The further out from the major cities you go, the wilder the rules become. Owing to a mingled lack of manpower and a lower potential for collateral damage, the things a mage can get away with in a place like this are far more broad than people realise. Far be it for the general public to know that the length of the Law’s long arm is all too often dictated by how many resources it will consume to extend it.

Newt is waiting for him out in the bedroom. Percival had chosen a double room with an en suite for them, all too aware that the curse’s unpredictable nature remains their greatest point of risk. If he is forced into another involuntary transformation then discovery could prove disastrous. Newt, of course, has his specialised _notice-me-not_ charm courtesy of Ibrahim, but he’s not in any way practiced with it, and even in his jaguar form Percival had read the strain casting it had put him under from the bitter scent of his sweat. Newt can be clever with his spells, but he lacks the endurance to be truly powerful. Travelling with him, _relying_ on him, is making Percival twitch.

He switches the shower off and steps out of the tub, reaching for a towel. This place is embarrassingly gauche, and he has no idea who they’re trying to cater for all the way out here, but he’d noticed their sign earlier in the day and it had promised all the mod cons, so he’d filed it away for later. Not a damned chance he was going to agree to spend another night in a dusty, run-down guest house with rats in the walls and bugs in the mattress. He smiles just a little at the memory of Newt’s expression when he’d turned that first place down. It had amused him at the time to turn his nose up like that, just to see what his companion would do. Newt had been predictably confused, and the comically affronted look on his face had given Percival a brief moment of warmth.

He sighs, scrubbing his hair dry and then swiping the towel across the mirror to clear the steam. Leaning forward he places his hands on the edge of the sink and stares into his own eyes. Mercy Lewis he looks like shit. His face is all dark shadows and pale skin, sallow and unhealthy. He looks sick, and he looks old.

“Christ,” he mutters.

Less than a week ago he’d been back on track, embarrassed but willing to move on, and not just the headlong tumbling of the last few months, but something with a purpose, something _new_. A little bit of- Merlin, of what? What the hell had he even been thinking? Newt had been more than a distraction, he’d seemed like… Percival laughs softly, shaking his head. He’d seemed like an option. Again, what the hell had he been thinking? He looks into his own tired eyes and sees a man past his prime looking back at him.

_Mistake after mistake,_ he thinks.

But Percival Graves is not a man to give up so easily. The smile his reflection gives him is grim and just on the wrong side of pleasant. It’s a wolf’s smile, the look of a man who’s never understood how to lie down and die. There’s nothing friendly in it, and for a second he thinks _you really believe Newt would want this?_

It stops him cold, the thought of that. Of what Newt would think of a man like him, of the things he clearly already does think. The way he’s reacted to Percival in the recent week or so should be message enough. He’s seen wariness, anger, maybe even fear. But the worst of it is the distrust. That had cut deep, because Percival Graves is a man of his word. He’s a representative of MACUSA, and it’s been his life’s work to protect the people of this country, magical and non-magical. He’s a good man, an honourable one, even if sometimes he has to be the bastard. There is nothing Newt needs to fear in him, nothing he needs to distrust. But he does, clearly he does.

He wipes a hand across his hair, drawing his palm over his skull to flatten the damp strands down. His magic is surly and unresponsive, or he’d have charmed it back into shape, an easy styling cantrip he’s been using for years. But now even that feels like an insurmountable challenge. There’s an unpleasant roiling in the pit of his stomach, as though he’s one sudden movement away from throwing up, and he aches like he’s sick or coming down with something. He’s been doing this long enough to recognise psychic drain when he experiences it, and were he at home he probably would have brewed himself up something to counteract the symptoms. The thought brings him back to Newt, who could, had he brought his case along, most likely have made him something suitable from his extensive collection of herbs and ingredients.  

His thoughts linger on Scamander, waiting patiently outside in the bedroom. Percival had left him fussing over the contents of the case, apparently nervous all over again to be alone in a room with him. Honestly, Percival doesn’t fully understand what he’s doing to set Newt’s anxieties off. They’ve spent the last few days alone in a cabin on a train - much tighter quarters than this for Morgana’s sake - and then bouncing from one side of town to another all day, and during all that he’d seemed perfectly fine. But now they’re here that same old evasiveness has crept back into his expression. Percival has no idea what he’s doing to cause it, and even less idea how to put a stop to it.

Maybe it’s when he has time to think. Even so, it still doesn’t quite make sense; there’s little more to do on a train than sit and watch out of the window. _The no-maj and her bracelet,_ he realises suddenly. Newt’s always doubted Percival’s intentions when it comes to the restriction of other people’s freedoms. Fearing for his beasts, for his livelihood, for his ability to practice his trade. Percival knows people fear him; damn, even his own aurors can be wary of him sometimes. He is the law, and on paper the law is unforgiving. It’s not fair though, it’s not the whole of the truth. _Merlin’s teeth._

He draws his fingertips down across his cheekbones, stretching the skin and feeling the tension in the muscles of his throat as he moves lower. This can’t continue, he won’t allow it. Something has to give, and he’s tired of waiting. Tightening the towel around his waist he looks around for his clothes. Damp and dirtied from steam and a day spent chasing ghost shamans around town, he’ll need to charm them clean. The thought of even such a small effort makes his head ache.

“Damn it,” he mutters, and snatches them up. When he casts it the cantrip burns through his veins, its pull on his reserves shocking in its intensity. Afterwards he stands with one hand pressed to the wall, feeling his head spin. He stays like that for longer than he wants to, until his vision clears, and he can once again see straight, and then drawing himself up he goes back out into the bedroom.

  


*

 

Newt is digging through the contents of the suitcase while Percival showers. He has one ear listening to the faint rattle and splash of the water, while the rest of him lets himself be distracted by the sorting. His mind is on another case, far away now, and his thoughts jump to the tiny hand mirror wrapped up in cloth and wedged between two of his shirts. He’s not even sure if he’d told Percival about it, or if the man had been compos mentis enough at the time of its acquisition to realise they have it. The device hasn’t chimed once since they left New York, and when he unwraps just the edge of the material he’s hidden it in there’s no telltale flash of light to indicate someone’s been trying to reach them. He sighs and pushes it back into its hiding place. If there was something wrong with the beasts someone would have contacted him, he’s sure of it.

The room in which they’ve been placed is just on the gaudy side of opulent, and Newt lets his gaze drift over the gilt-edged mirrors, golden tasselling and fancy bed linen. Had the sheets been silken he might have thought they’d found themselves in an upscale house of ill repute rather than a hotel. Honestly, he has no idea why Percival has brought them here; the price of board and breakfast alone had made Newt’s eyes water. Perhaps Percival doesn’t fully understand the exchange rate between muggle and magical money, because Newt honestly finds paying those rates when there’s perfectly reasonable, albeit simpler, accommodation elsewhere actually quite offensive.

In all honesty, Newt’s not sure he understands Percival Graves at all. This, in itself, is hardly noteworthy. Newt has long known that his grasp of human subtleties leaves much to be desired when compared to the ease with which other people read one another, but Director Graves stands out even in that. That they’ve been thrown together so awkwardly is hardly helping the situation. He breathes out a long, slow breath, gathering himself. The last...well, few weeks actually if he’s being honest, have been as full of ups and downs as a ship riding out a storm, and Newt feels somewhat like he’s been left clinging on for dear life.

Closing the case with a gentle click, Newt sits down on the edge of one bed, feeling himself sinking down into the mattress further than he has any right to. Grimacing he shifts around, then kicks off his shoes and lies back instead, staring up at the ceiling. The last two days have been a blur of anxiety-tinged boredom, punctuated by brief shocks of unpleasant excitement. Percival’s bad dreams for one, and the manifestation of his distress. That’s the kind of thing Newt hasn’t seen since his days at Hogwarts, and the little boy in the year below who’d woken the entire dormitory up by accidentally setting fire to the curtains on his bed every time he had a nightmare. Newt hasn’t thought of him in years, and he wonders briefly what had happened to him in the end. His problems had manifested as fire, where Percival’s are showing themselves as ice. Exo versus endothermic manifestation, he thinks, and wonders how it’s all tied in. Whatever it is, Percival is refusing to talk about it.

Newt sighs and rests the back of one wrist across his forehead. It’s ridiculous really. After everything that’s happened that Percival should be most embarrassed about something he clearly can’t control is a bitter form of comedy. Newt’s seen him trapped as a jaguar, cared for him like a pet, drunkenly cried on him, cuddled him in his sleep, and spent a night sleeping in the man’s arms. Gently, he closes his eyes. Although the embarrassment of it all is still there, somehow it’s lesser these days, as though the sheer monumental weight of it all has finally broken something fundamental in Newt’s ability to feel further humiliation. What’s next? he wonders absently. Is this the bit where they both get blind drunk and end up snogging one another silly in a drunken haze only to wake up the next morning to realise one of them was a jaguar the whole time?

Newt laughs to himself, sounding a little high-pitched and hysterical even to his own ear. All joking aside, the very thought of making a pass at a man like Percival Graves is absolutely ridiculous. Unfathomable. Merlin, simply imagining how badly it would go down makes Newt’s toes curl in anticipatory horror. He’d be lucky to get out of that one with just a punch in the mouth, that’s for sure. No, Percival Graves is far, _far_ outside Newton Scamander’s league.

It’s strange though how much easier it’s been since that night in the snow. It’s as though something has loosened between them. Newt finds himself capable of holding a conversation with the man now without feeling as though every word he says is going to land him in some sort of cleverly laid trap. He’s not sure if it’s simply a heightened vulnerability brought on by exhaustion that’s making Percival seem less threatening, or simply continued exposure to him that’s finally letting Newt feel as though he can relax somewhat around him now. Turn his back on him, so to speak. In truth, if he really thinks about it, it all got a lot easier after that night in the Twenty-Twenty-One, when the curse kicked back in and forcibly reverted Percival back to his animagus form.

_That says something unfortunate about your ability to deal with people,_ Newt thinks to himself, sighing.

In the bathroom the sound of the shower cuts off and Newt hears the heavy tread of someone stepping out of the tub. Time’s up, and he should change ready for bed. They have another day on the train ahead of them tomorrow, maybe two or three depending on how many towns they stop off at along the way. Quickly he sorts himself out, keeping half an ear tuned for the sound of the bathroom door opening, lest he end up caught halfway through changing. Times like this he really does miss certain aspects of having his case to hand. Luckily for him, Percival takes his time about whatever he’s doing in the bathroom, and by the time the door does open Newt is changed and already in bed, doing his best impression of snoozing. However it appears though, he’s listening intently for the sound of Percival’s movements.

Graves is clearly embarrassed by the state the curse is leaving him in, and, like many of Newt’s own beasts, is making every attempt to hide the extent of his discomfort. That’s completely fine, as far as Newt’s concerned. He has an entire career’s worth of observational tricks up his sleeve to make an accurate diagnosis of a creature that can’t communicate in words. And so he lies there, the table lamp on his side of the room switched off, listening to Percival’s uneven tread as he shuffles around the room. He sounds stiff, and Newt strongly suspects the showering this evening was more to do with keeping warm than it was with keeping clean.

There’s a long, silent pause, and Newt, lying on his side, begins to wonder what on earth the other man is doing. He’s about to roll over and look, thereby giving the game away entirely, when he hears Percival lower himself into bed. He does so with an audible wince, and Newt wonders what’s paining him. Psychic drain can be a real bastard, making its sufferers feel sick and feverish, with all the associated symptoms of a particularly unpleasant bout of the ‘flu, but so far Percival hasn’t seemed that bad. Maybe Newt really ought to make an attempt to brew something up for him - he could probably conjure a decent enough cauldron, and there are basic herbs in the medikit he’s brought. He does roll over then, but just as he does so, Percival switches out his light and Newt thinks _too late._

He lies still for a long while, listening to the soft sound of breathing, barely audible at this distance, and wondering how hard he can push the other man before he bites. At the end of the day he doesn’t wish ill on him - in fact the very idea of that makes him uncomfortable - but maneuvering safely around someone else’s pride is not something Newt feels particularly good at. Regardless, there’s only so long they can leave it before action becomes inescapable. He’s still wondering about this some time later as he slowly drifts off to sleep.

  


*

 

“...Newt?”

Newt wakes up with a jolt, uncertain quite where he is. He blinks into the darkness until his eyes adjust to the washed-out light seeping between the curtains.

“Are you awake?”

The voice is soft and scratchy, and something in the tone of it brings Newt sharply and fully to his senses. “Percival?”

There’s a pause, and Newt pushes himself upright, squinting into the gloom. At the far end of the room he can just make out the dark on dark shadow of someone standing, and it’s only because he knows Percival’s voice came from that direction that he doesn’t reach for his wand in alarm. He does reach for the lamp though, hand knocking against the water glass on the bedside table.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“Are you all right? Damn it, just a second-” He scrabbles around until he finds the light switch, and flicks it on. Both of them wince in the sudden light, but now Newt can see Graves standing over by the cabinet at the far end of the room. He’s squinting against the brightness, and his hair is mussed and untidy. He looks...Newt frowns. “Is everything…?”

Graves offers him a smile, but it’s empty and forced, there and then almost immediately gone. In the light of the bedside lamp he looks dishevelled and unkempt, half-asleep or just waking up from a particularly bad dream. “Sorry,” he repeats, his voice hoarse from sleep. “I was- I thought I heard…”

Newt glances around, listening. There’s no sounds but the tick of the pipes and the distant occasional murmur of traffic. The clock on the wall reads half past eleven - still early in the grand scheme of things. Neither of them have been in bed for more than an hour. “A dream?” Newt asks tentatively, and Graves once again gives him that brief flick of a conciliatory smile.

“I suppose so,” he says. “Yes. Yes a dream. I’m sorry I woke you.”

“It’s all right, I wasn’t really sleeping. Not properly.” It’s not even a lie. The last hour has been an unpleasant drift between dozing and awareness as he lay listening to Percival toss on the opposite side of the room. “Do you, uhm, can I get you anything?”

Percival has crossed to the window, drawing back the curtain a fraction to peer out. He pulls back, shaking his head, letting the curtain fall back into place. “No, I’m fine. I was just-. Sorry, Newt, go back to sleep.”

But Newt doesn’t believe the words he’s hearing. There’s too much tension in the other man’s body, and the curse has played too many tricks on them already for Newt to drop his caution. He watches Graves standing stiffly at the window, wondering as the man’s eyes flicker around the room in search of something. “I wish I’d packed a kettle,” Newt says. “Well, some tea anyway. There’s actually a little field kettle in the case, your aurors packed one for us. I think they thought we might go on a camping trip. But there’s no tea, they forgot the tea. Rather silly of them really. There’s coffee! Though I don’t think the middle of the night’s very good for that sort of thing.”

Graves is looking at him now, which was the point of Newt’s little speech, to get the man’s attention and be able to look into his eyes, thereby gauging his state of mind. He’s looking more firmly awake now, but that shifty tension is still in him, and his gaze flickers away from Newt’s almost as soon as it meets his own.

“No, I don’t think coffee’s the answer.” Graves pauses, and Newt lets him be, watching as he sorts through his thoughts. Suddenly, he seems to gather himself, and he looks up at Newt, his expression hovering very close to embarrassed as he says, “Do you mind if we were to talk for a while?”

Surprised, Newt shakes his head. “I, no. Of course not. I- no. I mean, go ahead.”

With a brief glance of thanks, Percival makes his way slowly back to his bed, sitting down on the edge for a moment before sliding back beneath the covers. Watching him, Newt asks hesitantly, “Do you want the light off?”

Percival laughs softly, and shakes his head. “I don’t mind, Newt. Whatever you prefer.”

“I’ll dim it,” Newt says, picking up his wand. “More restful that way.”

For a long few minutes they are silent then, and Newt, realising that Percival isn’t going to begin immediately, settles himself down comfortably again, lying on his side, the pillow scrunched up beneath his head. He’s reminded bizarrely of being back in the dorms at Hogwarts, in those secret hours past midnight, listening to everyone talking. There’s a comforting secrecy about the whole affair that’s both nostalgic and slightly jarring for it. “You wanted to talk?” he prompts gently.

Percival is lying on his back, staring up at the ceiling, his fingers laced across his chest. He breathes out once, slowly, and closes his eyes, wetting his lips. “I’m sorry,” he says again. “Every time I close my eyes I can feel myself getting tangled up in dreams. It’s...disturbing.”

“Curse dreams?” Newt asks.

Percival makes a soft sound of agreement. “Like I’m drowning. Ice everywhere. It’s somewhere up north I think. And it’s cold - very, very cold.”

He pauses for a long time, and Newt lies quietly, watching him. “What did you want to talk about?”

Graves breathes in and then out, long and slow. “I don’t know,” he admits. “Just something else. A distraction I suppose.”

Newt can understand that. He’s had enough nightmares of his own to know the desire to hide from the monsters in your own head. He lets his gaze wander along the edge of the comforter, wondering what would count as a suitable distraction. Work seems out, for a start - both of them have far too many tricky areas they wouldn’t want to wander into. “Tell me about being an animagus,” he says softly. It’s still a risk, but even if it makes the other man angry at least that emotion will give him something to cling on to other than fear of sleep.

“What do you want to know?” Percival asks, turning his head to look at Newt.

Newt can read surprise in the other man’s eyes, but no offence, so he shrugs as best he can while lying down, and says, “Whatever you want to tell me.”

Percival hesitates, clearly thrown by the question, but then he too turns on his side, and once more Newt is struck by the strangest sensation of throwback to a previous stage of his life. He wonders if Percival feels it too, if they ever did this sort of thing at Ilvermorny. He must smile or some such, for Percival frowns at him curiously. “What is it?” he asks.

Newt laughs, a little awkwardly. “I was just, never mind. Thinking of old days is all. Anyway, you were trying to tell me about what being an animagus is like, back in the club before- well, you know.” He gives Percival a slightly pained look, realising that perhaps he ought not to have raised that particular memory from its resting place. But Graves simply lifts his eyebrows and nods.

“I was, yes. I was trying to tell you about how it’s different.” He pauses, taking a deep breath as he considers his words. “I can’t remember where I got to exactly, before- well. But I think I was telling you that when I’m in my beast form the world is a very different place.”

“You said you don’t have the capacity to see the world as anything but a jaguar,” Newt supplies.

Graves blinks in surprise. “Yes, that’s right. You were listening then.”

“Of course I was,” Newt says, mildly offended.

Graves smirks, just a little, making Newt narrow his eyes at him. “I meant it,” he continues. “When I’m a jaguar I see the world as a jaguar sees it. It’s, how to put this... the colours are different. I don’t see as well, but I can smell like a- like humans _see._ There’s a lot more detail, you can understand a lot more from a scent than you do as a human. Read a lot more into everything. The world isn’t as colourful visually, but it’s a lot more colourful scent-wise, you understand?”

“What colours are gone?” Newt asks curiously. Part of his work has always been about understanding how his beasts comprehend the world, all the better to care for them, and to have the opportunity to speak to someone as close to a beast as is possible is something he can’t pass up.

Graves half-shrugs. “It’s more that everything is greener. There’s more yellows. Less reds. It all gets a bit blurry the further out you go.”

“Hm,” Newt says. “Interesting.”

In the dim light the exhaustion on Graves’ face is less pronounced. Newt can still see the dark circles that have sprung up beneath his eyes, but the paleness of his skin is obscured by the lighting. He seems, for want of a better word, _eager_ to tell Newt about his experiences as a jaguar. Certainly Newt’s words have put a hint of pleased satisfaction on the other man’s face.

“It’s the thinking too though,” Graves continues, and now there’s a look of uncertainty in his eyes as he seeks Newt’s gaze. “I mean that, when I’m a jaguar I don’t think like a man. That may sound obvious, but it’s true. I don’t look at a painting and think it beautiful. I can see it, and understand what it is, but nothing in it speaks of beauty to me.” He lowers his voice a little, his words coming somewhat more cautiously now. “The same for people. I don’t look at another person and think that they’re particularly fine-looking. What use has a jaguar for human beauty?”

Newt smiles and shrugs. It hadn’t really occurred to him that Percival might view that aspect of the world so differently as a beast. “What about another jaguar?” he asks, struggling to keep the cheeky smile from his lips.

“I’ll let you know if I ever meet one,” Percival replies smoothly, although Newt can see an answering smirk hovering around his mouth. They look at one another for a moment, and then Percival drops his gaze. Newt blinks, uncertain of what he saw in the other man’s eyes and wondering if perhaps he came too close to something personal with that comment.

“When did you become an animagus?” he asks suddenly, trying to stop the moment from turning tense.

Percival’s gaze comes back up to meet his and he raises his eyebrows, blowing out a thoughtful breath. “Mm, well. Actually, I was twenty-two. Which makes it, damn! Twenty-five years ago now.”

That makes you forty-seven, Newt thinks. Interesting. It’s a little older than he’d at first pegged Graves as being, but he knows as well as anyone that some magical folk wear their age far better than others. Percival is looking at him and there’s something a little uncertain in his eyes, as though he’s waiting on Newt’s reaction. With a start, Newt realises that’s exactly what he’s doing. “Why?” he asks quickly, unsure what response Graves is looking for.

“Why…?” Graves prompts.

“Why become an animagus?”

“Ah,” he nods. “Well, I doubt you’ll be terribly surprised to hear that at twenty-two I was rather confidant of myself and my abilities, and I believed it would be a...feather in my cap, so to speak.”

“And was it?”

Again Graves pauses, as though weighing up his words. Then he half-rolls his eyes, shaking his head with a sudden laugh. “No, absolutely not. In fact it made it a damned sight harder to get the promotion I was chasing because I had to prove every step of the way I wasn’t some kind of half-baked eccentric, or were-loving fanatic.”

“Were-loving what now?” Newt asks blankly.

Percival draws in a deep breath. “Hah, well. You’d be surprised at the attitudes of certain sections of society towards anything they deem, ah, how to put this?”

“Aberrant?” Newt asks innocently.

“Yes, quite. That’s a fair word,” Graves replies grimly.

“Actually, Mr Graves, I rather suspect I wouldn’t be surprised at all,” Newt says, and Graves squints at him.

“I suppose you wouldn’t be, all things considered,” he concedes.

They look at one another for a long moment, Newt keeping his expression studiously mild, Graves seeming as though he’s reassessing a previously held opinion. “And it’s Percival, you know,” he adds.

Newt smiles, just a little. “Sorry. Percival.”

Graves’ smile flickers, then fades, and his gaze drops to the floor, focus turning inward. Newt watches as his expression goes blank, then tightens, as though in pain. _The curse,_ he thinks, concerned suddenly. He pushes himself up onto one elbow, ready to get up and do- what? He’s not sure. _Something._ But Graves’ voice stops him, and Newt pauses, hand halfway to pushing aside the coverlets.

“Newt, there was something I wanted to say to you.”

Unnerved by the sudden seriousness of the other man’s tone, Newt feels his pulse skip and then quicken. As incongruous a place as this may be to reveal a hidden knowledge of Newt’s secret muggle associates, it’s still the first thing that leaps into Newt’s mind at the words. As it happens, he’s only partially wrong.

Graves looks over at him, then pushes himself up on to his elbow. He pauses, hesitating on an indrawn breath, then says, “I know that it’s been somewhat difficult for you to trust me, Newt. I am not unaware of my reputation, after all.”

“Mister- Percival-...”

“No, please. Let me speak.” Graves holds up one hand to stall him, and when Newt falls silent he nods in gratitude. “I understand that your profession and my own may sometimes appear to be directly at odds with one another. That there are certain ‘aspects’ of what you do that don’t fit neatly into the confines of MACUSA strictures. And I just…” He shakes his head, and for a moment his eyes slip closed. “I need you to know, Newt, that you can trust me. That I’m not ‘out to get you’ or your beasts. I- MACUSA is strict because it has to be. Because there are worse things out there that can happen than anyone really understands. That so many people chafe beneath the burden of our secrecy is a sign that they’ve been kept safe by it for so long that they’ve forgotten what the alternative is. What happens when things are other than as they are now.”

Newt’s brows draw down into a slight frown. No matter what Percival might think of him, he has heard this line before. “Mister Graves,” he winces at Graves’ answering expression. “ _Percival,_ I do understand what you believe, but at the same time, the world wasn’t always like this. The rest of the world isn’t like this. There are places where muggles and the magical community live side-by-side peacefully.”

“Newt…”

“But they _do!_ ”

“Newt, those places are not here. Can you imagine what would happen if the magical communities were to reveal themselves today? In America? With what happened less than ten years ago still fresh? It would be war all over again, Newt. We can’t risk it.”

Newt closes his eyes and draws in a deep, steadying breath. It’s not anger that rises in him now, but a sure and persistent sadness that latches on and drains him as thoroughly as any Lethifold. “You know,” he says. “I actually don’t disagree with you.”

Percival is silent, and eventually Newt opens his eyes. The other man is regarding him with something akin to wariness, as though he expects a ‘but’ to come at the end of that sentence. “No, really.” Newt continues. “I don’t.” He shakes his head. “My brother is Head Auror - you know what that means, I know you do - so I’ve heard all this before. And like I said, I don’t disagree. I’m not saying that there’s a simple solution, only that there _are_ other options and we shouldn’t be blind to them. Whether or not they’ll ever be open to us is something I’m not sure of, but I do know one thing, Percival, and that is that muggle or mage, people can be monsters, far worse than anything I have down in my case.”

Graves looks at him for a long time then, and Newt thinks he feels the other man’s mind brush his own. The touch is as projected and unconcealed as it’s possible to be, made just a little clumsy by his current condition, but it still startles him. There’s no attempt to push, no effort wasted on subtlety, the touch is just at the edges of his mind, like someone brushing shoulders with another. It’s a powerful wizard looking just a little deeper than with his eyes alone and had he less exposure to magical beasts and their tendency to do similar such things, Newt might even have missed it.

“I want to know that you do understand,” Graves murmurs, and there’s something in his expression that cuts short the rising objection in Newt’s throat. He sees and feels Percival withdraw, the soft pressure of his attention gone like so much smoke, the sudden quickening of his breath an indicator of how much even that small effort cost him.

“Please don’t do that,” Newt says softly. “I really don’t like people in my head.”

Graves shakes his head, “I wasn’t, I couldn’t-”

“I know that,” Newt replies. “But just so we’re clear. I don’t like it.”

Graves nods, wetting his lips and closing his eyes. Newt is a little taken aback to see further evidence of just how much energy he’d expended on so small a thing. “I would never read your thoughts against your will, Newt,” he says. “That wasn’t my intention. I just want to know that you understand me.”

Newt’s well aware of what Percival was trying to do, and although he’s not offended he’s still a little surprised he’d done it. Or rather, that he’d projected it so clearly. There are subtleties and nuances to such interactions that are common amongst skilled legilimens and powerful magefolk that Newt, lacking in any real gift for such skills himself, has never been made privy to. He’s heard about it though, about certain mages holding entire conversations with just a look and an exchange of emotion. It’s a mark of the subtlest of high wizards, and never before has anyone deigned to include him in such an overture other than, well. Other than Dumbledore.

“Then ask,” Newt says finally, still a little confused. “You don’t need to try and read me.”

Percival opens his eyes and shakes his head just slightly. “I need you to understand this, Newt,” he says. “Because I don’t think I’m making myself clear. I think I have- hell, I’ve explained myself badly. I feel as though I’m always choosing the wrong words.”

Newt frowns, shaking his head, and makes as though to speak, but Percival cuts him off. “Because if I wasn’t then I don’t think we’d have had quite so much trouble understanding each other as we have so far.”

Newt wants to protest, because people not understanding him is as common an occurrence in his experience as his not being able to understand them, but the stricken look on Percival’s face draws him up short. A little unnerved by it, he nods for Percival to continue, and the other man draws a breath. “I want you to know that you can trust me,” Percival repeats. “That I...that I am not working against you. I- Newt, listen to me. I joined the aurors straight out of Ilvermorny. It’s in my bloodline, it’s what I was always intended to do. The seers had been telling my parents my career before I was even born. I made senior auror by the time I was twenty-eight and Director by thirty-five, the point I’m making Newt is that I’ve seen...some _terrible_ things. I’ve seen things I don’t want you to imagine.”

Newt frowns across the space between them. Graves’ cheeks are flushed and he thinks, although he can’t be sure in this light, that there’s a sheen of sweat across his brow. “Percival,” he murmurs, confused by the man’s intensity, and a little intimidated by it too. “It’s all right, I understand, I think.”

Graves is shaking his head. Slowly he lets himself turn over onto his back, lowering himself down until his head hits the pillow where he lies, staring up at the ceiling. “I’m sorry,” he murmurs. “I’m not trying to patronise you. But I saw the look on your face this afternoon, when you came back from the bar. That no-maj girl with the charmed bracelet.”

He lets the words hang in the air, and Newt ducks his chin, biting at his lip. Of course Percival hadn’t forgotten that little detail. The man’s entire life has revolved around such matters. “I’ll go back tomorrow and obliviate her,” Newt says softly. “I just didn’t want to risk our-... _my_ relationship with Atiqtalik just yet.”

“You don’t even know this woman,” says Graves, and for a moment Newt’s not certain if he’s talking about the muggle or his contact. “This shaman of yours,” Graves clarifies after a second.

“No, but I respect her, and I’d like her to help us, rather than think we’re hunting down her friends,” Newt replies. He hears Graves breathe out - a sigh of annoyance or frustration, he’s not sure. In the street outside there’s a shout of laughter, and the heavy tread of men’s feet underscoring the lighter clip of a woman’s heels. The group passes by below the window and carries on its way, and Newt listens to the sound of their voices retreat as he waits for Percival to continue. Even now he’s not sure exactly what Graves thinks of the plan. He’s been mostly silent on the matter, taking Newt’s word on it with a surprising amount of trust for a man like him. In the dim light he sees Percival shake his head once, as though banishing a thought, and when he begins to speak again, his voice is pitched low.

“When I was twenty-two I ended up on a case far above my pay grade.” Percival says. “I had a mentor called Bishop back then, Havelock Bishop. He was an old bastard and he intended for me to go far, and his favourite teaching method was to dump you in at the deep end, then stand back and watch to see if you drowned or not. We all hated him as much as we loved him. Anyway. He got it wrong this time, put me in on a case that turned out to be something far worse than any of us had been expecting. We thought it was a smuggling ring bringing in restricted ingredients for potion making, but we couldn’t work out where they were sourcing the goods.” Percival pauses, lifting one arm to lay across his forehead. “Turns out we were wrong. They were a gang, a no-maj gang, and they were making the ingredients in situ by taking apart wands and ripping out the cores.Naturally they couldn’t use the wands, they just knew what was in them made effects they wanted. Drugs - Morgana, can you imagine it? The last thing you’d do with Dragon heart string is smoke the damned stuff, but that’s what they were doing. Of course, the wands had to come from somewhere.”

Newt is quiet, watching as Percival loses himself in his memories. He doesn’t want to hear the rest of this story, because he suspects he already knows where it’s going, but telling him to stop now would be both unkind and cowardly. “Did you...get them all?” he asks.

“The gang?” Percival replies. “Oh, we got them. All of them. Eventually.” He doesn’t continue and Newt shifts uncomfortably, trying not to draw attention to how ill at ease he feels listening to this.

“The thing that struck me about it though Newt, it wasn’t the mage folk they’d killed. I mean, they could have just stolen the wands and left the people, but they didn’t, of course they didn’t. No, it was the age of the gang members. Some of them were so young. How do you get like that so early on? They could have done anything with their lives. But no, they did this instead. Murder, truly brutal stuff, and for what?”

“Percival…” Newt says softly. He doesn’t have any answers to offer, at least none that aren’t shot through with his own brand of cynicism.

Graves raises his hand, gesturing at the ceiling in a disbelief that echoes down the years from that long-ago memory. “And it never changes. I’ve spent my entire life protecting the people of America, Newt. Both sides of the fold. Protecting them from each other and from themselves, and it never ends. It doesn’t change. The things I’ve seen no-majs do to our kind, and it’s not the powerful ones they go after. It’s the weak, the people just minding their own damned business, the normal ones, in the wrong place at the wrong time. Kids, elderly. You can’t imagine. You shouldn’t have to.”

“Percival,” Newt breathes again.

“No, listen to me. I’m not telling you this for pity, Newt. I’m telling you because I need you to understand why I do the things I do. Why we _have_ to keep things as they are. Why I can’t bend the rules. What do you think they’d do to that no-maj bargirl if the townsfolk found out she had a magic bracelet? The best she could hope for was that it’d be stolen from her. The absolute best.”

Percival has shifted back on to his side, pushing himself back up on his elbow, and he leans forward now, towards Newt. His face is lined with disgust, or perhaps a deep-seated and long broken in despair, and as he continues he shakes his head slowly, imploring Newt to understand. “I’ve pulled children out of no-maj mental asylums, locked up and worse because they can change the colour of their hair at will. Adults too - not everyone has enough magic to protect themselves. I’ve taken them from horrific conditions. People think it’s about the witch trials two hundred years ago, but that’s just the part everyone remembers. No, it’s the little things that make up the whole. The bias, the discrimination. You think we’re hard on them? Well believe me they’re just as hard on us.”

“I do believe you,” Newt says quietly. Despite all that he’s saying, he can tell that Percival is holding back. There’s something dark in his eyes and the tone of his voice that tells Newt there’s so much more hiding behind his words. He can see it in his eyes and he knows that were he a legilimens then the things he’d see inside Percival Graves’ head would be terrible indeed.

Graves holds Newt’s gaze for an uncomfortably long moment, until Newt can feel the desire to look away making him sweat, as strong as if someone has their hand on back of his neck, pushing his head down. To his surprise and relief, it’s Percival that breaks eye contact first. The other man flicks a smile down at the bedsheets then closes his eyes, shaking his head once. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m not trying to intimidate you.”

And that’s the problem, isn’t it? Newt thinks. You don’t even have to try, you just _do._ Except, he doesn’t. Not right now. Even in the dimmed glow of the lamp he can see the exhaustion in Graves’ face. It’s been there since they left New York, since he turned back to human there in the snow outside that little podunk town, and no amount of sleep is making it go away. He’s stretched thin, and burning up on the inside, and Newt doesn’t know what to do about it. One thing he understands though is that this intensity in the man, this need to explain himself, it’s hiding something else, something desperate that he doesn’t fully perceive yet. He can feel the shape of it formed by the tangential explanation he’s trying to give tonight, and see it in every hesitation before he speaks and then decides to say something else rather than what he intended. Percival’s been doing a lot of that recently, and Newt can’t make out what’s hiding behind the words he’s actually saying.

“I know,” he says simply. “I’m not intimidated. I am...concerned though.”

Graves’ eyes flick up to meet his and he offers that crooked twist of a smile that says _everything’s fine_ even when it’s patently not the case. Newt ignores it and ignores too the effect it has on him. Tries to anyway. Even exhausted the man has a charisma and banked power that speaks directly to Newt on a very physical level. Clearing his throat uncomfortably, he looks down. “You’re not sleeping properly, and you look sick. I’m not sure how to help you if you won’t tell me what’s wrong.”

Percival is silent for so long that Newt thinks he’s not going to answer. As the other man turns to lie back on the bed, Newt thins his lips into a disappointed line, and wonders what he’s supposed to do. If Percival won’t tell him anything, then what _can_ he do? But Graves isn’t ignoring his words, he’s just thinking. When he speaks it takes Newt by surprise.

“It’s just drain, Newt. Psychic drain. The curse is pulling on my reserves even as I’m building them up again, and I’m trying to resist it. But it’s hard.” He raises his eyebrows at this, seemingly surprised by his own admission. “I’ve never been hit with anything like this before and it’s...unsettling. I can’t sleep because it drags me down the moment I close my eyes, and I can’t stay awake because I’m exhausted, Newt. I am so fucking tired my damned bones ache.”

Newt winces. “What do you mean, it drags you down when you try to sleep?”

He sees Graves hesitate again, that same pause which tells Newt he’s holding something back, something that might be important. “Just tell me, please,” he says sternly.

Percival glances at him in surprise, then huffs softly in amusement. “I’m not hiding, I mean I’m not trying to hide anything,” he says, but his expression indicates otherwise and Newt tilts his head at him in disbelief. _You must think me an idiot,_ his face says. Graves winces.

“I keep having dreams about the ice,” he admits reluctantly. “About, I don’t know. The north I suppose. When I’m sleeping I’m dreaming and I can feel the curse lingering, it all has to be coming from that because I’ve never been anywhere up there to know what it looks like. I’ve barely even read about the place in books. But when I’m dreaming I am right there, in the water. It’s, it’s _cold,_ and sometimes I’m just lying on the shore, and other times I’m under the water and I’m drowning and I know right then and there that I’m, that I’m _dying_ , it’s awful.”

“And that’s when the ice happens,” Newt supplies. “I mean, on the walls and so on.”

Percival nods, “Yes that. The ice. It’s like it’s manifesting the dream.”

“And it’s getting worse?”

“Yes, it’s getting worse. Slowly. But it’s worse.”

Newt purses his lips in thought. “Did you get these dreams when you were a jaguar?” he asks suddenly.

Again, Graves hesitates, the pause so obvious that Newt cocks his head in surprise. “Percival?”

Graves lets out a heavy breath. “No, not like this,” he admits.

Newt regards him with astonishment. The answer to him is quite clear. That Graves hasn’t worked it out for himself is strange, enough that Newt suspects something else must be going on. “Then if that’s the case, why don’t you transform back and get some rest?” he suggests gently, aware that somewhere beneath the feet of this conversation the footing has the potential to turn treacherous.

The short burst of laughter from the other side of the room has nothing of mirth in it. Graves turns to him, glances up at his face, and then away, shaking his head. “Honestly?” he asks, and Newt tilts his head in query. Graves looks at him again, then lets his gaze be caught and held. Newt frowns at what he sees there, something wounded and wary behind the defensive screen of antagonism. He holds the other man’s eyes long enough for it to become uncomfortable, until Graves’ pinched smile turns into a thin, unhappy pressing together of his lips.

“Because I am _afraid,_ Mr Scamander,” Percival says, each word clipped and careful. “Because I fear that if I allow myself to take on my jaguar form there will come a point where I will no longer be able to turn back.”

Laid out like that it makes perfect sense, and Newt feels his heart pull at the thought of such a fear. To be blocked from and made afraid of something so fundamentally a part of oneself must be doubly upsetting. “It’s Newt,” he says gently, and then smiles when he sees the look of exasperation on Percival’s face.

“Of course,” Graves says, with mock solemnity. “Newt.”

He’d meant it as an attempt to break the mood of dread hanging over the other man, but Newt can see the uncertainty still clouding his expression, and can feel his own shoulders tightening in sympathy at the tension he can see in Percival’s body. “But it would help, wouldn’t it?” he persists. “To sleep, at least?”

“Yes, of course, but I don’t want to risk it, Newt. I can’t be trapped like that, I cannot-”

“What’s the alternative though? You look, forgive me, like you’re either about to faint or about to throw up. Like you haven’t slept in a week. You can barely cast a spell as it is, and if something doesn’t change soon I’m not sure you’re even going to be able to get up out of bed.” Newt shakes his head in exasperation, and Percival’s expression stiffens. “Look,” he continues more softly. “If it happens, I’ll be there. I won’t abandon you out here. We’ll just carry on until we’ve worked out a way to break the curse. Atiqtalik will help us, it’s going to be fine.”

Graves looks at him, and although he offers the briefest of smiles at Newt’s words, it’s nonetheless a grim one, wavering between hope and fear, the expression of a life-long cynic trying out optimism and finding it a poor fit.

“Besides,” Newt says. “If I’m wrong I’ll build you an extra specially tall perch in the case and you can live up there and disapprove down at the rest of us mere mortals for the rest of your life. Two square meals a day and I’ll even let you chase the Niffler once a month for exercise.”

Percival blinks at him for a second, processing this. “You are a little bastard sometimes, aren’t you?” he says in disbelief.

“Sometimes,” Newt agrees amiably.

Despite the honesty of Newt’s promise, Percival takes a few minutes more to think over his options. Newt lets him be, lying back on his bed and listening to the muted sound of traffic in the street outside. There’s not much, owing to the lateness of the hour, and as he lies there he realises how cold it’s gotten again. For a second he wonders if it’s another aspect of Percival’s curse making itself manifest, but then he realises that the whole room is chilly. Sitting up he stretches for the curtain and twitches the corner aside. “Hm, snowing again,” he observes. “Thought we were past that.”

Behind him he hears Percival throw back the covers and climb out of bed, and Newt looks questioningly at him as the other man reaches for his clothes. Percival spares him a brief glance. “If I do get trapped, the last thing I want to do is emerge in front of your shaman still dressed in my pyjamas,” he says drily.

Newt snorts laughter, and goes back to looking out of the window. “Fair point.”

He hears it when Percival pauses, and when he turns back the Director is watching him again, his long coat held between his hands, but not yet put on. For all that he’s made a decision, clearly the fear of losing his control remains daunting. “I won’t leave you,” Newt says simply, and Percival nods once, then swings the coat round and on.

“Fine, let’s get this over with,” he growls.

He transforms with all the fluid grace of a practiced animagus, and Newt, rendered astonished by it all over again, leans forward to look over the edge of the bed at the result. Percival looks back at him with his golden jaguar eyes, and Newt searches his expression for any sign of panic. “Can you..?” he asks softly.

Graves can, but it’s clearly more difficult than he’d hoped for. The transformation back leaves him gasping on his knees between the beds, and Newt hurriedly scrambles down next to him, reaching for his shoulder. Even through the thick layers of his coat Newt can feel the cold radiating out of him, and he leans back on his heels, watching as Percival’s gasping makes plumes of steam on the suddenly frigid air. “Breathe,” he soothes. “Slow down, just breathe.”

Percival shakes his head and coughs into the back of his hand. “Fucking Mercy Lewis,” he rasps. “Newt, I can’t. This is-.”

“Breathe,” Newt prompts. “Don’t panic, here-” he reaches across for the other man’s wrist, trying to get him focussed through touch, and as his fingers bump against Percival’s forearm Graves gropes blindly for his hand and grasps it tightly, his grip painfully hard. Newt swallows past the protests of his smarting fingers and says, “Breathe with me, all right? Slowly, keep it slow.”

Newt can see Graves trembling, can feel the shaking as he rests his free hand on the back of his shoulders. The air around them is frigid with curse drain as it pulls in the heat to fuel itself, and Newt isn’t surprised when Graves grits his teeth and grinds out, “I am fucking _freezing._ ” He sounds as angry as he looks, but as far as Newt’s concerned anger is probably better than fear if calm is beyond him.

“We could put you in the bath?” he offers, thinking of hot water and steam, but Graves shakes his head.

“I can’t,” he says. “I can’t stay like this. I’m going to have go back. It’s pulling on me, this was- ah fucking Merlin’s balls.”

With a grunt of effort Percival pushes Newt away from him and staggers to his feet. He balances precariously for a moment and Newt reaches for him, but stops before making contact when Percival manages to right himself. They look at one another for a second, Newt with expectant concern, Percival with a furious mix of anger and disgust at the world, and then Percival shakes his head. “I can’t hold this form,” he says, his voice low and full of the bite of self-recrimination. “I need to change back.”

“All right,” Newt replies, as calmly as he can. “I’ll be here. Perhaps you’ll gather enough strength overnight to revert. We’ll see in the morning.”

This time when Percival transforms he lands heavily and stands panting on the carpet, his fur glittering with frost. Newt reaches out to stroke the tiny crystals away and feels the hammering of the jaguar’s heart beneath his palm. Snatching Percival’s towel from where it was hanging across the back of a chair, he wipes the rapidly melting ice from the animagus’ flanks while Percival stands stiffly, letting his breathing settle back to normal. With the frost gone Newt tosses the towel in the direction of the bathroom, then sits down on the edge of the bed.

Percival stares up at him grimly, his normally intent feline gaze dimmed by strain. Even in his jaguar form he looks tired and miserable, the fear that he hides so well as a man projected far more clearly as a beast. Newt wonders if he knows just how easy he is to read in this form - in some respects at least. Whatever else Graves may be beyond anxious and traumatised, one thing is certain from the hunch of his shoulders and the tremble of his skin: he’s cold.

Newt looks away, knowing of a solution but not wanting to offer. Is it too strange? he thinks. Too forward? It _is_ cold in here, and he has no idea how to make the muggle heating work. There’s no fireplace in this room, but there is a radiator. Maybe if he were to fiddle with the valve on that...oh sod it. He’s just spent half an hour listening to Percival tell him how being a jaguar makes everything okay, even the most outlandish of things. “Here,” he says, drawing up his legs and climbing back under the covers. “I’m going to cast a heating charm on this blanket, it’s buggering cold in here. Do you want to come up here with me?”

Newt’s not sure what the long, thoughtful look he gets from the jaguar means, but it’s enough to make him think he might have misjudged entirely. He’d intended the offer to be friendly, some simple human closeness amidst a frankly terrifying situation, but perhaps he’s missed the mark. Percival can be very prickly when he’s afraid, that’s something Newt has come to understand intimately over the last few weeks. He’s about to offer to spell up the blanket on the other bed instead, when, with a huff of effort, Percival levers himself up onto the mattress beside him.

“Right, okay then, hang on,” Newt says, surprised despite himself, and reaches for his wand.

Big as he is, Graves takes up only half the bed. He stands, mostly in the way, as Newt flicks his wand across the comforter in a well-worn series of charms. The blanket soon begins to warm, and Newt smoothes the magic out across the fabric, one eye on Percival as he works. “Here we are, I quite like this one. Learnt it years ago right when I started travelling. Saved me from freezing my backside off more times than I can say, frankly. Not every beast lives in a jungle after all.” As he talks he watches some of the stiffness leaving the jaguar’s body, muted somewhat by the mundanity of Newt’s chatter and his staunch refusal to panic, even in the face of potential disaster. Newt’s an old hand at soothing traumatised beasts though, and animagus or not, the tenets of keeping panic at bay and soothing away fear remain broadly the same whatever the species.

Newt settles on his side, shifting a little awkwardly beneath a comforter made heavy by the weight of the beast on top of it. Next to him, Graves sniffs the coverlet and then settles down and stretches out with an exhausted sigh, letting the heating charms from the blanket soak up into his belly to warm his body. The bed is only made for one person, even so from the way Percival has settled Newt realises that the press of the jaguar’s flank against his side is not by accident. He watches the animagus’ eyes close, seeing some of the tension drain out of his body. The long, black tail has stopped flicking in agitation and his laboured breathing has returned to something resembling normal. Judging by the speed at which he’s settled into stillness, it could be the curse dragging him under, but Newt thinks it’s more likely simply to be fatigue. Worrying can be as much of a hex as an actual hex.

“All right then, sleep well,” Newt says, and, after a moment, reaches over the broad shoulders to switch off the lamp.

In the dark the only sound is the slow rasp of the jaguar’s breathing, close enough that Newt can feel the warmth of his breath across his face. He wonders again if this is okay, if everything between them is as it should be. Tonight has been as revelatory as it has been unnerving - honestly, Newt almost prefers it when there are things to go wrong that the pair of them can be distracted by. Things that mean they don’t have to talk so much. He winces into the darkness, knowing how bad that sounds even to himself. It’s not that he _prefers_ Percival as a jaguar - that would be an odd thing indeed - just that, Merlin, it certainly seems to solve a lot of the tension between them.  

As he lies there he thinks about the things Graves spoke about earlier, but about the things he didn’t say most of all. Newt knows the man must be under enormous pressure. As much as he tries to avoid the newspapers Newt does still catch them from time to time, enough to know just how vicious they can be with their speculation. Percival Graves has been holding on to his career, and his reputation, by the skin of his teeth this last year. It’s never really been something Newt thought to dwell on before, but coupled with his strange insistence on explaining his motives tonight he’s starting to wonder what’s really eating away at the defenses inside that cool, composed exterior.

Normally cool, anyway. Not so much recently, as far as Newt has seen. There’s a side to Percival Graves beyond the charisma and the easy confidence, that hides behind the dangerous competence and the flash of that arrogant smirk. He’s not all thrillingly powerful wizard, just...mostly.  

He thinks then of Grindelwald, and everything that bastard has been responsible for. Newt knows the story of how Percival Graves came back, how they found him trapped in a cellar deep underground, silenced and starved. The Prophet had said he’d been held captive for three months, but the Quibbler had gone further, saying he’d been found wandless and chained to a wall in the dark. Newt doesn’t think he’ll ever have the courage to ask for the truth; even if he thought it was any of his business it would still be a cruel question. Whatever the reality had been it would have left a lasting impression not only on Graves’ reputation, but surely upon his mind too.

_I need you to understand. I need you to trust me._

For the first time it occurs to Newt that Percival may be reading into Newt’s inability to interact easily with others something entirely other than what it means. The thought is a sobering one. If the motivation behind this fervent desire to be trusted stems from that mess with Grindelwald over a year ago, then they have more of a problem than Newt had previously thought. He couldn’t care less about what the papers say, or that the infallible Director Graves cocked up and ended up on the wrong side of a dark wizard’s wand - everyone makes mistakes after all - but what rankles him still is the complete lack of awareness the man appears to retain regarding the unfortunate invasion of other people’s privacy. Trust me, he says, apparently without irony. But trust, unfortunately, takes a long time to earn, and is all too easily lost in the pause between heartbeats.

Percival’s breathing has evened out further, slowing and deepening into the regular rhythm of sleep, and Newt, barely even surprised at the speed unconsciousness overtook him, reaches out into the darkness for the even darker shadow at his side. He pauses before his hand can touch the broad, flat expanse of the jaguar’s forehead, aborting the movement with a jolt of awareness of what he’s doing. He’s not a pet, or a toy. He’s not even a jaguar really, he thinks sharply to himself. Petting him when he’s asleep, “jaguars think differently” or not, is not acceptable.

_Idiot,_ Newt scolds himself.

He winds his arm back in, letting it rest above the covers and instead listens to the soft sound of Percival’s breathing until sleep claims him too.

 

 

*

  


He’s gone when Newt wakes up.

Newt opens his eyes to the dim light of early morning, the wall clock telling him that it’s just brushed past seven am, and for a moment wonders why the empty spot next to him should matter. It takes his brain a moment to process the lack of a jaguar, the only evidence of his presence being the scattering of black fur across the crisp, white coverlet. At first he thinks Percival must be in the bathroom, but when that proves empty Newt begins to cast around for clues. There’s nothing. The case from MACUSA is still stored neatly under the bed, the window is closed and locked, so too is the bedroom door. In a flash of inspiration Newt checks the bedside table next to the other bed. Percival’s room key is missing. For a minute Newt simply stands in the centre of the hotel room, hands on his hips, and shakes his head in disbelief. Not even a note. Well, he can’t have gone far, he reasons, and, with nothing better to do, takes himself off for a shower.

Percival turns up again at breakfast. Newt has found a seat at a table in the furthest corner of the hotel’s dining room, as far away from the scant collection of other guests as he can get, and has already eaten his way through two boiled eggs, half a rack of toast and a bowl of porridge. He looks up at Percival as the man appears in the doorway to the dining room, and narrows his eyes. If nothing else he’s at least human again. Newt had been pretty certain of that, owing to the fact that jaguars, generally speaking, can neither unlock hotel doors nor handle a key with enough dexterity to lock them behind themselves once they leave. Still. The relief he feels at the sight of Percival restored irritates Newt with its sudden intensity.

Graves wends his way between the tables and takes a seat opposite Newt, flicking a napkin across his lap before reaching for a slice of toast. Only with great effort of will does Newt resist the urge to slap his hand away. Instead he glares, and then frowns. “You look...tired,” he says, amending his original phrasing down from _bloody awful_ to something slightly more polite.

‘Tired’ is somewhat of an understatement, and Graves grunts an acknowledgement, mouth already full of toast as he raises a hand to signal a waitress over. As she takes his order, Newt takes a closer look at his companion. Graves is as smartly turned out as he ever is - neatly pressed shirt, tie arranged just so, hair perfectly styled. But there’s a sheen of sweat across his brow that returns even when he dabs it away with his handkerchief, and his eyes are bloodshot and sore-looking. When the waitress leaves, the hand that raises the mug of thick, black coffee she’s left behind shakes so much that he almost slops liquid over the side.

Newt waits until the waitress is far out of earshot, then leans forward across the table and says, “Where did you go?”

Graves drains his coffee then looks with intent at the rest of the toast on Newt’s rack. He reaches for it, and Newt doesn’t even bother trying to stop him. “I’ve found her,” Graves says, voice low but filled with satisfaction.

Newt raises his eyebrows and leans back out of the way as Graves pulls the marmalade over to his side of the table. “Who?”

“Your shaman,” Graves replies as he prepares his toast with a thick layer of butter.

Newt blinks and leans back in sharply. “How?”

Reaching into his pocket, Graves pulls something out and puts it on the table between them. In the light of the room’s fancy crystalline chandeliers, the little bone charm glimmers amidst its nest of leather, and Newt draws in a breath. “Where did you-?”

“I went to visit your bargirl this morning. She needed to be obliviated and I needed the charm off her.” He glances up, and seeing the expression on Newt’s face, says, “She couldn’t be allowed to keep it, Newt.”

Newt frowns and shakes his head. He knows that full well, and he’d been intending to do something about it himself, but something about Percival’s actions rankle. “I know that. But- bloody hell, it’s barely even eight o’clock!”

Percival snorts and makes short work of the slice of toast he’s been buttering, devouring it in three large bites. The waitress returns then, placing a fresh rack down between them and pouring another steaming cup of coffee for them both. Newt waits until she’s left once more, then says, “I was going to-”

Graves cuts him off with a wave of his hand. “It doesn’t matter. It’s my fault, I should have taken it off of her yesterday. I am an auror, Newt, it’s my job.”

Newt purses his lips, and busies himself with pulling toast off the fresh rack. His appetite’s vanished, but he needs something to look at other than the grim expression on Percival’s face. His sudden disappearance this morning had unnerved Newt far more than he’d at first realised. “Fine. You said you’d found her. How?”

Graves lowers his voice until it’s barely audible and says, “I cast a tracking spell using the charm as a foci. I have enough of a fix on her that I’ll be able to tell when we’re close even if we’re on the train at the time.”

Lowering the butter knife, Newt pauses in amazement. “You did what? How- I thought you could barely-!”

Graves half-winces, half-shrugs, and says around a bite of toast, “Wasn’t the easiest of things, but it was necessary.”

Newt snorts in disapproval. “Last night you could barely stand you were so weak! You couldn’t even stay in human form, and now you’re casting tracking spells like it’s just another day at work…!”

Percival has stopped eating, toast halfway to his mouth, and is staring at Newt with an expression of mingled amusement and mild affront. “Mr Scamander,” he says slowly. “Despite my title I am still an auror, and we aurors are not paid to be fragile. Needs must, and precisely because of last night I think you’ll forgive me my eagerness to have all this come to some sort of conclusion.”

Bewildered and amazed, Newt can only shake his head and lift his eyebrows at the other man. He paints a fine picture sitting there trembling with exhaustion, taking just the briefest of breaks from stuffing his face to compensate for the spell drain he’s forced on himself, only so that he can declare himself perfectly fit for duty.

“Amazing,” Newt says. “You aurors really are all the same.”

Graves gives a little shrug and a slight nod, lifting the toast back to his lips, before saying, “I’m not entirely sure that was a compliment.”

“It _wasn’t,_ ” Newt says testily, and snatches a final piece of toast from the jaws of its inevitable doom before Percival can claim the whole lot for himself. He doesn’t miss the amused smirk that hovers around Graves’ lips as the man devours his way unashamedly through the rest, but his chance to pull him up on his damnable arrogance and unbelievable cheek is ruined by the return of the waitress and her platter of fried food. Stowing the observations for later, Newt instead sits back to watch his companion eat, and thinks to himself that despite his every effort to appear otherwise, underneath that calm, collected exterior, no matter how handsome and powerful he may be, Percival Graves, is, after all, just a man.

The revelation is as startling as it is profound.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As I was writing this I had a thought - can you imagine if jaguar!Graves snored? I mean, it’s bad enough when the cat does it right next to my head at night. Imagine how _loud_ it would be for an animal his size. :|9 Anyway. 
> 
> So, right, I had a longer explanation as to what comes next, but honestly tl;dr whatever happens there’s physically a hefty chunk of wordcount to write before the next time I post, so please bear with me, it’s probably going to take a bit longer than usual. Basically I want to post the final chapter and the epilogue together because it would be awkward and jarring to wait a week to read an afterword that ties everything up nicely. 
> 
> In the mean time, if you’re after more Newt/jaguar!Percival fluff, you can check out the stand-alone I wrote for the FBC event [right here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15241788). It’s not set in this timeline so contains no spoilers for this fic, but does have some more jaguar fluff for those who want to see more of that kind of thing.
> 
> Interesting link: [What I'm basing Percival's jaguar vision on](http://uk.businessinsider.com/pictures-of-how-cats-see-the-world-2013-10). 
> 
> As ever, I really appreciate you all for your patience and encouragement, thank you! It's almost over. ;]


	12. For every action a consequence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The shaman, the storm, the curse.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ufff, tedious age-old story: RL got in the way. 
> 
> Let's get going though! Onwards to the resolution.

 

 

 

_“Fuck.”_

Percival stops dead, and Newt carries on past a few paces before he too draws up short, almost slipping over onto his backside as he struggles for purchase on the icy sidewalk. Absently Percival puts a hand to the back of his shoulders to steady him, his other hand, the one clutching the bargirl’s bracelet, going to his forehead where he presses his curled fingers against his skin.

“What is it?” Newt asks, grabbing for his arm and steadying himself awkwardly, feet sliding beneath him. Percival glares down at the ground, frowning, and Newt clings tight to his forearm, carefully regaining his balance. “...Percival?”

“Lost it,” Percival mutters.

Newt blinks in understanding and looks around at the surrounding houses as though he can somehow spot the magical trail they’ve spent the morning chasing. Blacksville is another small town in a chain of such places strung along the line of the border like a string of distant pearls. They’d disembarked the train just after ten, following Percival’s tracking spell down the main thoroughfare and out towards the edges of the settlement, heading west along the road out of town. Although snowflakes are no longer falling, the air is bitterly cold, and the town lies blanketed beneath a deep layer of white. The sidewalks and the main roads have been cleared, but as they’ve come further from the centre of town the roads have become less well-kept and the pathways untended. Newt looks around longingly at the rows of small houses to either side; the warm glow of their lights, lit even at this time on so gloomy a day, like little beacons of warmth and hospitality.

“Can you find it again?” he asks, still peering into someone’s kitchen where a fireplace flickers and a small white cat on the windowsill watches him back through narrowed yellow eyes. Percival grunts, and New smiles at the creature before making an attempt to disengage his arm from the other man’s grip. Busy concentrating, it takes a moment before Percival remembers to let go. Newt shrugs his coat a little higher up over his shoulders and wraps his arms around himself against the cold. The road they’re on is entirely residential, far enough out from the centre of town to allow the houses to have generous front gardens and rear plots of land cut off from the surrounding plains only by the width of their fences. If they go much further down this road they really will be on the camping trip the aurors back at MACUSA had apparently packed them for.

“It’s gone,” Percival says, turning a slow circle. “Morgana’s tits…”

Newt isn’t entirely surprised. Atiqtalik has made it her life’s work to remain concealed from the the interested gazes of the southern wizards, her lack of tolerance for their interference being a point that had always shone through in her letters. With that in mind, Newt counts himself particularly lucky to have been taken into her confidence at all. If it hadn’t been for the good word put in for him by a mutual contact it seems likely she’d have turned even him away. It makes him fidget with guilt to think that she might accuse him of disloyalty or betrayal for having brought a wizard like Percival out here to her very doorstep. He frowns around at the silent landscape and the watchful windows of the houses, and wonders if maybe he ought to have just come alone.

“Can you see that rabbit?” Percival asks suddenly, and Newt, startled out of his private torment, blinks and looks around. Some distance away, there’s a large, snowy white creature, sitting in the middle of the road watching them with unreadable black eyes. It’s bigger than a rabbit by no small amount, and blinking Newt ventures, “Yes, I can…?”

“It’s not a portent then,” Percival sighs.

“No, it’s an arctic hare,” Newt replies. “It’s much further south than it ought to be though. I think. I mean, I don’t know for sure, but I’m reasonably certain.”

Percival peers closely at the animal, and Newt looks from the frowning auror to the hare’s twitching nose and back. “I’m sure it’s not dangerous,” he offers tentatively.

His companion sighs softly. “We’re what, six, seven hundred miles from the start of the Arctic Circle, Newt?”

“I suppose so,” Newt shrugs.

“Then this little guy is a _long_ way from home.” Percival starts carefully down the road, moving slowly so as not to startle the creature.

“What are you doing...?”

“Following the white rabbit, Newt,” Percival says back over his shoulder.

“It’s a- oh.” Newt pauses. “Right. I see.”

Cautiously the two men approach the animal, and when they’re just about in reach of it, it turns slowly and begins to lollop off down the road ahead of them, following along one of the wheel ruts left by a long-departed vehicle. Percival draws up short, and Newt pauses next to him. “Did your friend ever mention having a familiar?” he asks.

Newt shakes his head. “I didn’t ask. Makes sense though.” He looks sideways at Percival from the corner of his eye. “Let’s hope it doesn’t turn into a shaman when we’re least expecting it.” Percival looks at him sharply, but Newt has already started off after the creature. “Come on, or we’ll lose it!”

They follow the hare along the increasingly snowy road, the creature staying just ahead of them as they pick their way through the snow, occasionally offering one another an arm in support. The houses of Blacksville begin to peter out the further they go, the space between the plots of land beginning to increase, workshops and small sheds making up the difference, until eventually they cross the boundary where town becomes countryside and it’s nothing but them and the road. The white hare continues to lead them onwards, never too far ahead, but never allowing them to come close enough to touch. Out here the snow is almost two feet deep in places, and like the beast they follow a meandering route that takes them down the middle of where the road must lie, where the wind, or someone’s efforts, have reduced the snow to a more traversable depth.

The road curves its way round a thick stand of trees, and Newt sniffs the air, wrinkling his nose at the welcome smell of woodsmoke. Another quarter of a mile and they see a small lane split off from the main road, marked out by a break in the fencing that sketches the outline of someone’s large front yard. A two storey house stands set back against the trees, a curl of smoke lifting from its chimney, its facade painted a pale, shell pink. It’s unusual, but still clearly of muggle design. The hare takes the turnoff that leads down the driveway and disappears off towards the house.

Newt and Percival follow as far as the gate, and then stand looking at the wooden sign nailed to the fence post. Icicles hang from the paneling and a small secondary sign announcing “Vacancies!” swings suspended from twin hooks below. “ _Wanderfalls Guest House”_ is painted in faded and curling script along the board. Exchanging glances, the two wizards make their unsteady way up the drive, trudging along in the snow in pursuit of the beast. As they leave the main road the first gentle flakes of fresh snowfall start to spiral silently down from the sky.

They find the hare on the front porch of the house. It huddles against the foot of the door, its nose twitching, staring off unreadably into the distance in the way of such creatures. Newt kneels down and peers at it, but doesn’t reach out to touch it.

“Well then,” Percival says softly. “Shall we knock?”

Newt rises to his feet, and nods.

The woman that answers the door is not Atiqtalik. This lady is tall and quite thin, her ash-blonde hair lying in a plait down one shoulder. Her face is severe, and her cool grey eyes take them in and find them immediately lacking. Percival offers her a smile that makes the most of his charm, and Newt is immediately glad of his presence.

“I’m sorry to disturb you, ma’am,” Percival says smoothly, and although he’s entirely expecting it Newt still feels himself mentally double-take at the change in tone, from informal to _Government Official_. Even now it still manages to catch him by surprise. “We’re here to visit a lady I believe may be staying with you. We’ve come to ask for her assistance.”

The woman draws in an unimpressed breath, her lips thinning, and then sighs. “Well, you’d better come on through then, hadn’t you?” she says, and turns away from the door. The white hare jumps up from its huddle on the doorstep and hops inside after her. Without turning, she calls back over her shoulder, “And close the door behind you. Keep the heat in.”

Exchanging glances, Newt and Percival follow.

  


*

 

The Wanderfalls Guest House has a small sunroom at the rear of the property that looks out onto the trees and through to the grassland beyond. The room is long and narrow, warmed by a log burner and thick drapes that stand open at the moment to allow sight out across the snowy yard. There are three faded green armchairs, and a long, low coffee table taking up most of the space. The woman who answered the door to them leads them through the gloomy interior of her house and then gestures them inside, before taking her leave. She departs as soundlessly as she’d led them, fading into the interior of the house and out of sight.

The woman who must be Atiqtalik is sitting in the middle armchair of the three, facing away from them towards the windows. From where they stand her face is not visible, but from the pluck and sigh of her movements, she appears to be sewing. The arctic hare hops its way around the base of her chair and disappears somewhere around her feet.

“Um, hello?” says Newt, tentatively.

For a second there’s no reply save the rasp of her thread and the pop of her needle through the thick fabric in her lap. Then she flicks a fold of material out across the arm of the chair and tilts her head sideways so that she can catch them at the very edge of her vision. Newt hears her hum quietly, and she nods towards the other chairs. Cautiously, the two wizards make their way between footstools and fabric bags, Percival stepping carefully over the now sprawled form of the hare, and take a seat one either side of her.

Atiqtalik is much younger than Newt had expected. Somewhere in her early twenties perhaps, she wears her long black hair in two loose braids that fall either side of her shoulders, and her forearms are lean with muscle. Her skin has the weathered look of a woman who has spent the majority of her life outdoors, and her clothing is the plain shirt and trousers of a farm labourer, the sleeves rolled up to her elbows, no hint of the robes one might expect of a witch. She keeps her eyes on her sewing as she works, her expression composed, and there’s a calmness about her that quietens the anxiety roiling in Newt’s belly.

“Ms Atiqtalik?” Percival asks, and Newt frowns at him. He’d hoped Percival would keep quiet and let him do the talking, but his impatience seems to already have gotten the better of him. Graves ignores him, but all he gets in response to his words is a single flick of her eyebrows. Having received neither warning nor true encouragement, Percival continues, “We followed your familiar here - our thanks for sending him. I don’t think either of us have ever seen such a creature so far south.”

Atiqtalik draws the fabric up across her knees, folding it out of the way, and lets her needle start picking along the newly exposed edge. She seems to be working on a heavy coat of some kind, her pale needle making fast work of the seam, the thick thread humming as she draws it through the fabric. When she replies, her voice is low and touched with an accent Newt doesn’t recognise. “I would have sent you my seal, but he stayed home. He doesn’t like the fish they serve down here.”

Although Percival’s expression doesn’t change, Newt knows him well enough by now to see that he’s struggling to work out if she’s serious. From Newt’s experience of Atiqtalik’s letters, it’s probably somewhere in the middle. “I’m sorry we’ve dropped in on you like this,” he says quickly. “I know you weren’t expecting us.”

Newt pauses, feeling awkward. Telling her who they are and why they’re here feels suddenly very difficult, the reason for their presence unforgivably presumptuous. Atiqtalik looks up at him briefly, her deep brown eyes amused. “I knew you were coming, Newton. I was beginning to think you were lost.”

“Ah,” Newt says, at once both surprised by her knowledge and grateful for it. “Well, yes. Sorry. We just, I mean I wasn’t sure where you’d be exactly.” He pauses, struggling for something both polite and appropriate, then makes a show of looking around. “This place is very nice.”

Atiqtalik laughs softly, but doesn’t reply. Percival catches Newt’s eye with a glance of warning that makes him blush, before leaning forward in his chair and smoothly steering the conversation back on course. “Ma’am, I must apologise for disturbing you as we are, but if you knew we were coming, then perhaps you also know why?”

The shaman looks at him sideways, the movement of her needle never pausing, the look in her eye considering. “They don’t tell me everything,” she says finally. “And I don’t always see it all, but I know you’ve got something that doesn’t belong to you.”

Her voice is accented strongly enough with her own language that although she speaks fluently it still takes Percival a moment to confirm his understanding. He’s not sure who ‘they’ are, but he has a broad enough knowledge of shamans to know that she’s not referring to the townsfolk. Of course, he does have in his possession more than one thing she could be referring to. Newt is already reaching for his suitcase, but Percival shakes his head minutely to still him, and draws the bargirl’s bracelet from his pocket instead. Laying it on the table next to her pincushions and thread he gives her a tight smile. “I’m sure you understand I had to return this to you, as it was brought to my attention by certain circumstances.”

Atiqtalik snorts softly, giving the bracelet barely a glance. No matter what Newt may think of MACUSA’s laws and Percival’s actions, the wizarding Congress of America is well aware of the magical communities that exist far from the modern cities, and although their representatives are rarely seen around the Woolworth Building and relations between the two are often strained, they are nonetheless well-established. Since the history between the two has been somewhat turbulent, and what’s more this particular shaman hails from across the border, there are certain interactions he’s under heavy pressure to treat with both care and subtlety.

“Do you know what it is?” she asks him mildly.

Percival doesn’t blink. He also doesn’t know for sure, having touched its magic only enough to draw a trace to its creator. “A fertility charm, I believe.”

Atiqtalik tuts, and shakes her head, but doesn’t say more. Newt is watching this exchange nervously, hoping that Percival’s actions won’t sour either his relationship with the shaman, or their chances of enlisting her aid.

“Atiqtalik?” Newt asks hesitantly. “We came, or rather, I brought Per- Mr Graves here, because he needs your help.”  
  
“Does he?”

Percival lifts just the tips of his fingers in Newt’s direction to quiet him, then takes over again. “Newt, if you could get the box out? Ma’am, before I say anything more, I must assure you that I am not here in a professional capacity. However, I have been advised by Mr Scamander that you are a person who may have specialist knowledge that could help us, and I’ve come primarily to seek your advice.” He pauses to gauge the shaman’s response, but Atiqtalik’s eyes remain on her needlework. Doggedly, Graves continues, “About three weeks ago we recovered a stolen artefact from a hidden cache in the wilds, one which we believe may have originated with your people.”

As Newt sets his suitcase across his lap and opens it up to fish out the amulet, Percival begins a succinct retelling of the story of how the amulet fell into MACUSA’s hands. When he reaches the part where the curse first fell upon him, he keeps his voice steady, without any trace of accusation - as far as he’s able. “I touched it inadvertently, and the artefact cursed me. It forced me into my animagus form and drained my magic, and now it keeps on forcing me to revert against my will.”

Atiqtalik snorts softly, and leans forward to glance into the box which Newt very carefully opens and tilts in her direction. She stares into its depths for a long few moments, but doesn’t put down her sewing, or reach out herself. Then she leans back in her chair and continues her needlework.

Percival and Newt exchange glances. “Are you aware of this amulet, and of the curse on it?” Percival asks slowly.

“It’s not cursed,” Atiqtalik says shortly, and turns the fabric across her knee to begin a new section.

“It most certainly feels and acts as though it’s cursed,” Percival says carefully.

“It’s not cursed,” she replies adamantly. “It has consequences riding on it, but consequences are not curses.”

Newt closes the lid of the box, letting the latches snap shut with a click. “It does feel like a curse, Atiqtalik,” he offers hesitantly. “I mean, I’ve been travelling with Percival since the day he was afflicted and I’ve seen the effect it’s had on him first hand. It, it eats away at his magic and forces him to take on his animagus form, it’s really quite ferocious.”

Atiqtalik looks at him shrewdly, as though she’d expected better of him.

“Curse or consequence,” Percival interrupts, “It’s dangerous, and the effect is getting worse. What _is_ this amulet? What is it used for? And why is it doing this?”

The pop and squeak of her needle and thread does not cease, but the shaman’s lips thin and her eyes narrow. It could be irritation at a reluctant thread, or displeasure at the question, but she gives no indication as to which. Newt shifts uncomfortably, feeling the tension on the air like a weight across his shoulders. Percival waits, calm and coiled all at once, like a beast waiting to pounce, and Newt feels his irritation rise at it. He’d not brought him here to interrogate the shaman like a criminal.

“It was a woman’s gift to her husband,” Atiqtalik says eventually, her voice low, words clipped with disapproval at having to explain this to them. “A symbol of her love. A protective charm. When he was lost the sea sent it back to her so that she might remember him. She died before it was found, and her children put it on her cairn where it has remained, until it was stolen.”

“You knew this woman?” Percival asks quickly, and Atiqtalik gives him a withering look.

“No, I did not know her. I am not shaman for every group living along the coast.”

“Then how-”

“Because she is very famous among the people, and her cairn is a sacred place.” Finally, Atiqtalik folds away her sewing, setting the thick material down on the table beside her chair, and leans back, her hands folded across her stomach. She tilts her head at Percival who has moved to the very edge of his seat that he might face her more easily, and sighs. “We knew that the amulet had been stolen. I had been sent word some weeks back. But tracking such a thing is difficult, and it had taken some time to notice that it was gone. The place where it should rest is remote, far from any settlement, and the people who come round to tend the site were much further along the coast when it was taken. It was not yet time for them to return.”

“But why leave such a dangerous artefact out to be discovered? Was it protected in any way?” Percival asks, and Newt wants to kick him for the tone of _auror_ he can hear in his voice.

Atiqtalik shakes her head. “By a hundred miles of snow, and the full force of winter. By the respect of the people to whom it belonged and the sacred nature of the site it was left in. You ask why it was not protected, I ask you why was it stolen?”

“The thief has been detained,” Percival says grimly. “He’s in custody and will be punished for what he did. He’s...known to us.”

“Hm,” Atiqtalik narrows her eyes at him, her disbelief outweighed only by her lack of surprise.

“If you knew it was missing, why didn’t you report it to MACUSA?” Percival asks. “There are agreements in place, procedures for dealing with such incidents should they arise. Instead, it was only luck that Mr Scamander was in the right place at the right time, and swift action by MACUSA aurors that brought the artefact into safe storage.”

“It was already making its way back to us,” Atiqtalik shrugs.

“By way of cursing me?” Percival asks with raised eyebrows.

“It is not a curse,” Atiqtalik reminds him. “It is a consequence called into being by the act of removing the amulet from its resting place.”

“ _I_ didn’t steal it,” Percival says icily, some of his professional charm slipping for a moment.

“No, but you kept it, didn’t you?” she replies, eyes narrowing again. “It was sitting in your auror lockup, secure in that box with the rest of the thief’s hoard.”

Percival frowns, leaning back slightly. His voice takes on the patient diplomatic tone of an official in charge of public relations. “MACUSA would have seen that the item was returned to your people-”

“Really?” Atiqtalik breathes in mock wonder. “When? This century or next?”

Newt, feeling the already strained conversation taking a rapid detour towards an all-out argument, clears his throat noisily and dives in, trying to avert disaster. “Ah well, whatever the case, we’re here now, Atiqtalik. And we really need your help to understand the, uh, _consequences_ that are still very much afflicting Mr Graves. I mean, it’s not really his fault it was stolen, and he was actually pursuing the thief at the time the amulet _afflicted_ him. So, as you say, in a way it was already on its way back, but that doesn’t solve our immediate problem.”

Newt shifts round in his chair too so that he can sit side-on to the both of them. “We are very sorry the amulet was stolen, and of course that was entirely reprehensible on the thief’s part, but can you take it back for us? And...perhaps stop it from turning him into a jaguar every few days? I mean, I don’t mind carrying him in my case, but he does have his own career to pursue outside of being a beast, and well, he eats rather a lot so…”

Percival glares at him, but Atiqtalik gives a sharp bark of laughter. “A healthy appetite is a good sign in a beast. Perhaps Mr Graves should enjoy the time to consider life and his place in it? Or just enjoy the free food, that’s also a good choice for a jaguar.”

“Unfortunately, ma’am, my schedule is very tight, and my responsibilities prevent me from enjoying such extended periods of down time.” Although Percival smiles, the expression is tight, and his dark eyes glitter dangerously. Almost a month living under the gradually worsening influence of this curse have rendered him almost entirely incapable of making light of the situation. “Now, you’ve indicated that this amulet has been removed from a place sacred to your people. Is there any possibility that you might return it on our behalf? Would that remove these…‘consequences’ from me?”

The shaman shakes her head slowly. “Too late for that,” she replies simply. “It’s leaning all its influence on you now. You’re too caught up in its undertow. Like a dolphin struggling in a net, gone in where she shouldn’t be.”

“Then what? Do we take it back to the tribe-?”

“No, you stay away from them, city wizards. They don’t need to have you poking around. Besides, you’d never find them.”

“You could take us to them, as our guide,” Newt interjects. “We’d, I mean, I’m sure MACUSA would pay for your services.”  
  
Atiqtalik shakes her head and leans her head back against the chair as she stares out into the falling snow. “I could, but it would do no-one any good. It’s not the people you need to go to, it’s the place. And there’s no point me taking you there, that’s up to you. You go, you return what was taken, you finish what was started. Maybe you untangle yourself in the doing.”

“And...if I take the amulet back to the, ah, the cairn? That will remove the consequences?” Percival asks slowly.

Atiqtalik shrugs. “Depends on you. Depends why it’s leaning on you so hard. Do you know why it’s doing that?”

“If I knew that I would have unpicked the knot a long time ago,” Percival growls. “Listen. I understand that what I am referring to as a curse, you are calling ‘side-effects’-” he holds up a hand to forestall her interruption. “‘Consequences’ I understand. I think, at the end of the day, we’re talking about the same thing. Basic training tells me that I need to understand the _consequences_ if I’m to be released from them, so I’m asking you now, why is it cursed?”

“It’s not cursed, stupid boy,” Atiqtalik says to him. “It’s trying to talk to you and you’re not listening. How have you become so powerful if you are so blind? Does MACUSA prefer its leaders unable to see past the tips of their noses?”

Percival is drawing in a breath between his teeth, and his smile has turned as chilly as the air outside the house, when Newt nods and interjects, “Actually, I’d rather wondered that myself. But, have mercy on us Atiqtalik. This whole situation has become a real mess, we’re doing our best here.”

Deliberately taking a step back from the conversation, Percival draws a hand down his face, turning to look out of the wide windows and across to the darkened stand of trees. A regular flurry of snowflakes are falling from the sky now, twisting down fast enough to fill the tracks that lead out to the bird feeder in the center of the yard. In the corner the clock is ticking away the minutes and he can feel his patience sliding away along with them. With every tick the curse tightens its grip on him, drinking a little more of his energy and his will to fight back. This has to stop, something has to give.

“I see the ocean,” he says stiffly. Out of the corner of his eye he sees Newt lean back in his chair, satisfied perhaps that he’s finally co-operating. “I am drowning, sometimes. I hear a voice, her voice I suppose - the lady this belongs to. And I’m struggling, and cold; frozen to the bone. From what you’ve said I suppose I’m reliving in some way what happened to her husband, and that’s her I hear in the waves. I suppose she’s calling me- him, _the amulet_ back home.” Percival pauses thoughtfully, and both Newt and the shaman watch him closely. He turns back to her, shaking his head. “But why does it force me back into my jaguar form? That’s what I don’t understand. Even if it drains my magic, why does it insist on making me take that shape? It’s not what happens naturally if I overextend myself, it just doesn’t work like that.”

Atiqtalik hums, and reaches down the side of her chair to bring up a bottle. A little shot glass is upturned over the end as a second cap, and she removes this, setting it on her knee and gesturing to the cabinet along the far wall. “Newton, there are glasses in there.” As Newt gets up hurriedly to obey, she pours herself a dram. “It’s not turning you into a jaguar,” she tells Percival quietly, as Newt fumbles around in the cabinet. “That’s just your reaction to what’s happening.”

“Don’t try to tell me I’m doing this to myself,” Percival scoffs, voice pitched as low as hers.

“I didn’t,” she replies. “Learn to _listen._ Your body is coping with what’s inside that pretty head of yours by responding in this way.”

“Ah, here we are!” Newt returns, a pair of glasses clutched tightly in his hands. Atiqtalik hands off the full glass to Percival and then pours two more.

“But, why my jaguar form?” Percival asks, shaking his head slowly in confusion.

Atiqtalik shrugs and folds one arm across her chest as she sips at her whisky. “You tell us.”

For a minute they drink in silence, the whisky burning their tongues as the snow continues to fall outside. Newt watches Percival anxiously, trying not to fidget, and Percival frowns down into his shot glass as though scrying it for answers.

“Did you ever think to put the amulet on?” Atiqtalik asks, and Percival snorts as Newt nearly chokes on his drink.

“I hardly think that would have been a wise idea,” he drawls.

She shrugs indifferently. “Many would have. If only to see what happened.”

“Playing chicken with artefacts, cursed or not, is a damned fool’s game,” Percival says grimly.

“Perhaps,” Atiqtalik replies. “Or perhaps you would see more clearly. Perhaps there are things you are refusing to look at.”  
  
Percival sits back in his chair, shaking his head sharply, just once, at her words. The smile that pulls at his lips is twisted with wry acknowledgement, but shows enough of his teeth that it makes Newt double-take nervously. “I would rather you tell me the way to appease the amulet’s magic so that I can go on with my life without being forced into submission every other day.”

The clink of the glass being set down on the low coffee table, amidst the thread and discarded fabric, is loud in the otherwise quiet sunroom. “They are not my consequences, Percival Graves, they’re yours. I cannot solve them for you.”

Percival rubs at his brow with the fingers of one hand and lets out a long, slow breath. “Enough riddles, please,” he says softly.

Newt frowns down into his shot glass, the whisky mostly untouched, his mouth a thin, unhappy line. Atiqtalik has gone back to watching the snow fall, her hands once more laced across her stomach. “Direct is in your nature,” she says. “It is why you have so many problems. Go then. To the cairn. Put the amulet around your neck and listen for once in your life.”

“That is absolute madness.” Percival lets his hand fall away from his brow as he looks to the shaman in disbelief. “I’m not putting a dangerous cursed artefact around my neck-”

“Are you afraid, city wizard?”

“No, I am not afraid, this is simply the most fooli-”

“You asked for my advice. In fact, you dragged Newton across half the continent to find me, risking discovery, risking your friendship, risking your what-? Do they know what’s going on back in the houses of MACUSA? I am told they do not. It is written all over you. So secretive! You come here demanding answers and now you have them you will not listen!”

“I am listening, but I’m not about to-”

“Please! Stop it, the pair of you! Just stop. This isn’t helping anyone!” Newt holds his hands up pleadingly, and they both fall silent, Percival with gritted teeth and grim mouth, Atiqtalik with the ghost of a smile on her lips. “Look, Percival, we came here for Atiqtalik’s advice. She knows the magic her people use better than we do, so we should trust her. And Atiqtalik, honestly, there’s a lot riding on this, and you know that. So if we do this will it work, and what’s going to happen?”

Percival looks at him a little strangely, but Newt spares him only the briefest glance in response. Atiqtalik purses her lips and raises her eyebrows. “You’ll go to the cairn, he’ll put the amulet on and see what there is to be seen. Then...what happens, happens.”   
  
“That’s hardly reassuring,” Percival mutters.

“No, it isn’t. Life is risk, Percival Graves.”

With a dark look at the shaman, Graves replies, “I suppose I have no choice. If you cannot remove these ‘consequences’ yourself, it would appear I must do as you say. Where is this place then?”

“Ah, now that is a secret not for you to know.” As Percival draws in his breath to reply, she smirks at him and turns her attention to Newt. “I will show him though. Newton?” She crooks her fingers at him, and Newt leans forward obediently. She places her fingers lightly on the side of his head, and murmurs, “It is here.”

Newt gasps, and Percival twitches, but stops himself from making a move towards either of them. “I- I’ve got it, right, thank you, yes,” Newt mumbles. He blinks rapidly, shaking his head as though to clear it, and sits back in his chair, his eyes somewhat distant. “That is a very long way, I’m not sure I can- well, I can try. I mean, I can, just I haven’t jumped so far in a very long time.”

“How far?” Percival asks in concern, but Newt doesn’t appear to hear him.

“I wasn’t sure if Percival should apparate,” Newt continues. “I mean, you’re not really supposed to with an unknown curse running.” He looks to the shaman, who shrugs in response.

“Carry him, it will do no harm.”

“Side-along?” Newt clarifies, and she nods. “Yes, I suppose I can do that. Yes, all right.”

“Once you get there, you should use no magic,” Atiqtalik cautions them. “The site is sacred, and you do not know the proper ways to pay your respects. Besides, the amulet will be calling back to its home and that is all you need to listen to.”

“Take the amulet back, and all this will resolve itself?” Percival asks, seeking one last point of clarification.

“Something will resolve itself, yes,” she replies. Her eyes narrow with something mischievous at the look he gives her. “The amulet’s _‘curse’_ will be broken, city wizard. The rest of it is up to you.”

Percival meets her gaze evenly, and if there’s any doubt in him he’s careful not to show it to her. Instead he places his shot glass down next to hers, and smooths his palm across his forehead. “Is there a restroom I might avail myself of…?”

“Down the hall, second on the right.”

After Percival’s footsteps have faded, Newt shifts in his chair and glances across to Atiqtalik where she sits, gone back to watching the snow, her dark eyes unreadable. The arctic hare sneezes at her feet and rearranges itself with a huff, stretching its long legs out along the side of her chair. “I’m sorry our first meeting had to be this way,” Newt says quietly. “I never intended to impose on you like this.”

Atiqtalik smiles, the expression making her face seem even younger. She has a nice smile, Newt thinks, though perhaps not one you’d trust. Albeit in a good way, maybe. “I heard on the wind you were coming,” she says. “The hare told me, and you were in my dreams the last month. I’m glad you’re here. Now I can go back to dreaming of my old dog.”

Unsure quite how to reply to this, but not unused to the strange paths her thoughts take, Newt simply smiles. “Still, I’d have liked to have come with more notice. I was going to write to you from New York, but well, things happened.”

Atiqtalik hums, and then turns her head, chin lifted to look up at him. “You’re in deep with that one, Newton.”

Newt blinks. “Yes, well. Also unintentional,” he mutters, giving her a somewhat guilty look.

“Watch your fingers,” she warns him. “Jaguars are predators, and it’s in their nature to bite, pretty as they are.”

“You don’t trust Percival?” Newt asks, feeling alarmed at the idea. He understands that the community from which Atiqtalik hails has little reason to respect the representatives of MACUSA, but he’d thought somehow that Percival might be, well, different. Newt has seen that he’s trustworthy at least. Well, he’s become trustworthy.

Atiqtalik sees the self-doubt in his expression and nods. “I trust him to be true to his nature,” she replies. “Just be aware of what he is, Newton. And where he comes from. They’re not like us, MACUSA’s folk. They don’t see the world as we do.”

Newt looks down, frowning. “I’ve come to trust him over the last few weeks. Ask me a month ago what I thought of him, well actually even a week ago and I’d have probably said something quite different. But I’ve seen him now, Atiqtalik, I’ve seen what he’s like underneath. Don’t look at me like that please. I’m not being duped, or, or taken in by a pretty face! I’m not like that.”

She smiles, but it’s not condescending. “No, none of are, are we?”

“Still, it’s good to finally meet you, properly,” Newt says at length. “I know you’re busy, and this isn’t the best way to repay your friendship, but well, I believed your people would want the amulet back, at the very least. And you’d probably rather not have MACUSA up here breathing down your neck or interfering with the tribe.”

She snorts indelicately. “They’d have to find us first, but I understand. Thank you for thinking of us. I’ll have to send word back home that it’s been found. They were panicking, you know. I was very close to having to do something, but I knew you were coming. Things resolve themselves sometimes if you don’t interfere.” She reaches down and brushes the ends of the hare’s ears with her fingertips, making it snuffle and sniff. “But I think this will not be the last we hear of this.”

Newt shakes his head, well aware of Atiqtalik’s efforts to prepare her people for the future. A seer of no little gift, she has spent the last five years of her life far down here in the south making inroads amongst the muggles, looking for ways to avert a future she fears. Newt’s not entirely sure what she’s seen, only that it frightened her enough to give up her place as shaman and move down here, far from her people. “Whatever happens,” he says, “We’ll face it.”

“That is inevitable,” she nods. “But we will choose the place.”

Newt smiles. Atiqtalik’s determination is as legendary as her temper. He’s about to say more, but at that point they hear Percival’s footfall in the corridor, and a moment later the Director returns. He looks paler than he did earlier, and Newt frowns unhappily. The curse is still exerting its influence, no matter how they refer to it. “You’ll eat before you go,” Atiqtalik says to them both, folding her fabric back into its bag. “One last meal before the end.”

Percival looks at her in alarm as she pushes herself to her feet, and Newt just shakes his head at him. Atiqtalik cackles in amusement as she slings the fabric bag under the coffee table and heads for the door.

“She’s joking,” he murmurs to Percival, as he rises to follow the shaman from the room. “I think.”

Percival gives him an unimpressed look. “She better be.”

He almost trips over the hare on his way out as the creature slips between their feet in pursuit of its mistress, avoiding disaster only by catching himself on Newt’s shoulder. Newt ducks his chin and gives him a weak twist of a smile in response, one that does nothing to reassure either of them. “Come on, if I’m going to have to apparate us both that far I’m not doing it on an empty stomach.”  

  


*

 

 

The land stretches away in all directions, a monochrome of stone and snow, blindingly bright and deeply, bitterly cold. The whip-crack of apparition is like a gunshot that echoes across the landscape, and as the two figures appear, one stumbles clumsily and almost goes to his knees.

Percival grabs for Newt’s arms then curses, getting an arm around his waist to keep him upright as the other man lists drunkenly. Newt’s eyes are unfocussed and he leans heavily against Percival’s chest, giving a low groan of discomfort. Graves puts a hand under his chin, trying to look into his eyes and get a read on him.

“Oof, bloody hell,” Newt slurs. “Hang on, just hang on. That was...that was a long way.”

“Are you..?” Percival holds him upright until Newt finds his balance again. He shakes his head to clear it, and Graves waits until he gets a nod of confirmation before he carefully lets the other man stand on his own.

“Sorry, I’ve never jumped that far before,” Newt apologises breathlessly. “Not with another person in tow.”

“Hm,” Percival says, still looking deep into his eyes. Newt is skilled with his apparition, more so than the average wizard, but he’s strong with short jumps, not the types of distance he’d implied were involved here. Satisfied finally that Newt can keep his feet on his own, he lets his hands fall from the other man’s shoulders, and looks around.

As far as the eye can see the landscape is a snowy sea of rock and ice; tiny, wind-burnt patches of scrubby foliage clinging low to the ground the only indication of life. The wind is a constant pull at their thick clothing, and the shock of such a sudden drop in temperature has left them both gasping a little to compensate. Before they’d left the guest house, Atiqtalik had given each of them a set of thick trousers and large, hooded pullovers that Newt had said were made from caribou pelts. It had taken a few adjusting spells to make them fit properly, but one of the things the shaman does to keep herself in coin down south is apparently to provide the local outdoor labourers with this specialised winter wear. At the time Percival had thought the garments unwieldy and unnecessary, but standing here now with the wind dragging its claws across his skin he’s more than glad of the clothing and the heating charms Atiqtalik had woven into their folds.

“I can’t see the cairns,” Newt says doubtfully. He looks around, squinting against the wind, trying to feel for anything magical. The landscape around them may look bleak, but beneath the ice he can sense a thrum of magic that sends an electric shiver across his skin. It feels like the glitter of sunlight on snow, and the endless dark depths of the ocean, like falling downwards forever with nothing to reach for to save himself. He pulls back from the shape of it, startled by the enormity of its silent, waiting presence. Atiqtalik had said not to touch, and he knows better than to ignore her warning.

“Let’s get on with this then,” Percival says, closer to his ear than Newt had expected. “Give me the box.”

Newt pulls the amulet’s container from beneath his parka and hands it over, his movements made clumsy by the thick gloves he’s wearing. Percival takes the case and slips the latches open to reveal the amulet lying within. He pauses, looking up at Newt, and for a second their gazes meet. Newt can read an apprehension in the other man’s eyes that he’s not used to seeing there, and he smiles reassuringly. “Don’t worry,” he says. “I’ll get us home no matter what happens.”

Percival nods once, curtly, and then gathering himself reaches inside the box to take out the amulet.

Before his fingers even touch the carved bone, Newt both feels and hears the rising whine of resonant magics, as though some unseen person has flicked a tuning fork with their fingernail, setting the very air around them alive with the hum of it. He grimaces in uncertainty, seized by a desire to reach out and tell Percival to stop, to just wait a second, but Graves has already lifted the amulet from the case, his mouth set in a grim, determined line. In one, quick movement, he slips the cord of the amulet around his neck, and all at once everything changes.

The blizzard hits with the force of a freight train, a blinding white wall of snow that drives them both to their knees. It comes from nowhere, with no warning, and is on them before either wizard even has chance to realise what’s happening. Newt chokes, the wind whipping snow into his mouth and stealing the breath from his body. He holds up his hand, covering his face to give himself space to draw breath, and even through the thick layers of the parka and the heating spells woven into it, he can feel the wind drawing away his body heat with bitter claws. The world is a wail of sound, the wild scream of the wind like the roaring of a Nundu in his ears, deafening and all-consuming. He’s faced conditions like this before, years ago, and the sudden shock of it puts him back five years to another blizzard, another chase through the dark and the snow, another person cursed and in need-

Someone grabs his shoulder and Newt’s startled shout is torn away by the wind. Percival looms out of the snow, bumping into his side as he pulls himself up next to Newt. The hood of his parka is still down around his shoulders, and Newt can see the bone amulet nestled at the nape of his neck, gleaming a cold witch-fire blue against the parka’s dark ruff of fur.

“We have to go!” Percival leans forward, his mouth an inch from Newt’s ear, one arm hooked around his shoulders to pull him in close. “..can hear her calling. This way!”

They scramble to their feet, dragging one another upright and bracing against the monumental battering of the wind. Newt can feel fear stirring in his belly, the force of the blizzard still stealing the breath from his lungs, the suffocating cold making him clumsy. To be able to reach through the thick layers of caribou pelt and the weaving of shamanic heating charms alike he knows that this storm is nothing close to natural. Percival has his hand around Newt’s upper arm, and Newt shifts until they’re arm in arm, clinging on to one another. One foot in front of the other, they begin to walk.

The blizzard is relentless, the world a whiteout of driving snow. The ground beneath their feet is treacherous, snow over ice over rock, and every few steps one of them slips, forcing the other to pull them upright. Newt is forced to follow Percival’s lead, letting the other man pull him along in pursuit of something only he can hear. He’d said something about a woman’s voice, and Newt can only assume that the amulet, or maybe the magic attached to it, is guiding him. Whatever’s going on, as soon as Percival had slipped the thing around his neck it hadn’t been just the storm that had risen up. Newt can feel the magic of this place thrumming like a struck gong - a constant, low reverberation of power that’s either lying behind the gale, or, he suspects, the force that’s driving it on. Doggedly they trudge through the snow, battling on against the elements, and each footstep takes them further into the heart of the storm.  

Amidst the drudgery of effort, time loses its meaning. The blizzard saps warmth and strength alike, pulling at their clothing and snagging at the heating charms woven into the furs, scouring away at them until they start to flicker and fade. Tiring already, Newt finds himself losing his grip on Percival’s arm, and more than once they flounder, reaching blindly for one another in the howling wind. He can feel his face freezing, ice gathering around his mouth and nose, his skin too numb to burn. Fear is starting to build in him, and he grabs blindly for Percival, thinking to tell him to take the damned amulet off, that this is going to kill them both. But like the storm, Percival is relentless. He trudges ahead of Newt, pulling him onwards, until he too slips and Newt is the one to pull him to his feet. Then, tentative balance restored, once more they continue.

Time distorts beneath the effort of remaining upright, the simple drudgery of making progress an almost impossible task that steals all of their attention. Amidst the howling of the storm the world is rendered strange, an alien land that roars its displeasure, a furious beast too wild and enormous to be tamed. Trapped within the maelstrom of its power reality distorts, the ground vanished beneath the whirl of snow, white on white, the sky and the land as one. Newt begins to lose focus, confused by the cold and disorientated by the shifting magics all around them. Percival is an indistinct figure at his side, and sometimes his form loses focus and it’s not a man he’s following, but a jaguar, blacker than shadow, leading him on through the storm. Sense becomes fluid and whether it’s the cold or the strange magics of this place making him see these things he doesn’t know.

Suddenly, Newt feels himself slipping again, and no longer able to tell which way is up, he flounders. Percival disappears into the driving snow and he reaches after him with a yelp that’s torn away by the wind. He shouts Percival’s name, scrambling to find his feet, instead coming down hard on his knees again. Panic grips him - if they lose one another out here then the likelihood of one or both of them succumbing to the blizzard increases a hundredfold. And then without warning there’s a drop-off in the ferocious wind, the wall of white opening up to allow depth of vision again. Newt looks up, squinting against the still fast-falling flakes, and with a flood of relief sees the shadow of a figure making its way back to him. He pushes himself onto his heels, readying himself to reach up and be pulled properly to his feet, but as the person draws close he draws back in shock. For a moment the other person looks down at him, and Newt blinks back at them in confusion.

“...Leta?” he says.

  


*

  
Percival realises it the second he loses Newt. Even through the debilitating cold and the pounding of his heart he knows that something is wrong. He turns and behind him there’s nothing but a wall of white, snow whipping past so fast it’s impossible to pick out the individual flakes. For a moment he stands, trying to make out the other man’s form in the storm, but it’s a lost cause. On top of the exhaustion of stumbling through the storm, the magic of this place is playing with his head. His reserves may be low but the power of it is so strong that he barely needs to try in order to sense it. It’s making his head swim with the strange resonances of its unfamiliar weavings, and he’s finding it hard to focus.

A flicker of colour at the edge of his vision has him turning, and there’s Newt. The lanky man stands with one hand raised against the driving snow, the other beckoning for Percival to follow. Newt’s coat is a vibrant blue in the blizzard, easy to pick out, and for a second he wonders why he’s taken off his fur pullover. The thought slips away, and Percival reaches out for the other man’s hand. But Newt is already turning and, frustrated, Percival follows. He can’t hear the woman’s voice any more, and the loss of it is making him think that something must be wrong. Perhaps they’ve gone too far and missed the cairns completely, or he’s too tired to hear her any more. Whatever it is they need to stop and take stock. He calls out for Newt to wait, taking one laborious step after another in pursuit of him.

Newt moves fast and Percival struggles to keep up. Perhaps he’s found some kind of shelter - trust Newt to know how to survive in a place like this. But he’s going so fast, every step taking him further away, and no matter how hard he tries it’s a struggle for Percival to keep up. He pushes his aching muscles harder, driving himself onwards, but, every time he tries to call out for Newt to stop, the blizzard whips his words and his breath away, leaving him choking. A small, shrewd voice at the back of his mind is whispering insistently that _something is not right here_ , but it’s the easiest of things to push it away. Instead, he carries on chasing Newt, growing ever more frustrated by his inability to catch up.

When, finally, Percival does reach him, it’s because Newt is no longer moving. He sees the bright blue of the other man’s coat first, stretched out on the ground and covering over rapidly with snow. With a dismayed shout Percival plunges through the storm, going to his knees at Newt’s side. He’s lying face down in a drift and Percival grabs at his shoulder, tugging him over onto his back with a great effort. He leans back to take stock, and flinches away, hands pulling back in shock.

The person lying before him is not Newt.

The woman’s eyes are closed and her skin is pale in death, her dark hair tumbling out from the hood of her parka and spilling out across the snow. Percival sits back on his feet, astounded and confused.

Somewhere in the distance he can hear the cracking of the ice as it breaks along the shore, and hear the wild, high scream of a seabird.

The woman opens her eyes, and they are the stormy, unending blue of the winter ocean.

  


*

  


“I...this is, you’re not really here. You can’t be here, Leta.”

Newt can feel the cold seeping through the thick fur lining of his trousers and into the bones of his knees. Something is going on here, he knows that, but he can’t work out what this is. A vision, or a dream? Is he face-down in the snow somewhere hallucinating in his final moments? If so, what a bitter, sad thing to come up with. Leta leans down, and her smile is as sweet and sad as he’s always remembered. “Newt,” she says. “What are you doing out here?”

“Well, I could rather ask you the same thing,” he says, reluctant to take the hand she extends to him, but unwilling even now to refuse her.

“I came to find you,” she tells him. When he doesn’t take her hand, her smile falters but doesn’t fade. Instead the sadness in it grows, replacing any pleasure there had been at the sight of him. “Newt, you’re a long way from home out here.”

Newt risks a glance away from her, trying to catch sight of Percival. He can’t be too far away, and the winds have dropped off enough that he should be able to hear him if he calls out. But for all that the snow has died down the visibility is still poor, sight obscured after several feet by a thin, misty light that Newt suspects cannot be natural.

“Leta,” he tries. “Where are we? What’s going on?”

“You tell me, Newt. I’m here because you brought me here.”

“But I didn’t, I didn’t do anything! I just-”

Leta’s expression changes - a tiny, subtle shift that takes her from concerned to disapproving in half a second. It’s a look that says _“Really Newt? Who is it you think you’re fooling here?”_ Merlin, but he’s so familiar with it! It’s the look that had kept him on his toes for years. Kept him coming back for more, knowing that behind the judgement there lay a fierce mind, a person who saw that he _could_ , even when others said he couldn’t, when _he_ said he couldn’t. A friend who saw his worth when no-one else cared to. He’s missed that. He’s missed _her_. He’s longed for that friendship for so long now, has been mourning its loss for a decade.

Newt stares at her, at the face, once merely pretty now grown into the full beauty of womanhood, that has haunted him for years. Every month of his life since Hogwarts, since childhood, has been influenced by the memory of her, by the memory of what they once were to one another. He’s seen her, on and off over the years, from a distance mostly, too ashamed and too nervous to ever approach her properly. Not after what happened. He can’t imagine that she would ever be interested in speaking to him again. Certainly she made that quite clear when she allowed Theseus to begin courting her.

Newt stares up into the face of the girl that he once adored, and realises with sudden, visceral shock, that she is not the person he once knew. This is not the face of the girl that sat opposite him in the kitchens long after midnight and plotted secret trips out to the forest to spot unicorns and centaurs. It’s not the face that he thinks of when he remembers Leta, or when he thinks of her in his idle moments. The logical part of him knows that she’s a woman now, that she’s twenty-seven years old and long departed from childhood. And yet, when he thinks of Leta he still pictures her as she had been the last time they saw each other as friends - he still sees her as the young woman smiling shyly in the photograph on his work cabinet. And yes, that same sadness is still in her that had always been there, but it’s tempered by adulthood now, by age and experience. By the will to stand on her own that she’d always had. He’s long admired that steel in her.

This is a vision, he thinks. This is me, or this place. This isn’t Leta. And yet, _it is._

This is Leta as she really is. A grown woman that exists outside his memories, outside his world, outside of his responsibility. This is the Leta that lives in the real world, the one that has nothing to do with the maudlin comfort of his brooding and memories of her. The Leta that has her own life, that went her own way. Funny, he thinks, how it sometimes takes an outside perspective to wake you up to a realisation. Even if that outside perspective is a sacred magical place.

“I’m sorry,” he says bleakly, thinking of all the weight he’s put on the shoulders of the Leta that lives in his head, the one that’s ten years younger than the vision that stands before him now. He wonders then what exactly the nature of this place is.

“Oh, Newt,” Leta says, shaking her head. “You’re always so hard on yourself.”

“Why did you leave me?” he asks her suddenly, and even as he says the words he hates how childish they sound, how petulant and selfish. Merlin’s teeth, has he always been this terrible? He closes his eyes. “Sorry, I mean. I- I always thought we could still have been friends. I thought that, but then you never spoke to me again. And then, with Theseus- Leta, why would you do that?”

She tilts her head, one eyebrow arching. “We were children, Newt. I did what I did, and we both know why. Everything that came after that? I didn’t try to hurt you. I didn’t do any of it to hurt you. We do what we must in life to protect ourselves. We go forward, not back. We have to. We each take our own path because that’s all we can do. We live our lives the best we can.”

“I have been,” he says, flushed and ashamed to find tears in his eyes. “I tried to forget you.”

“Did you?” she asks him, her voice mixing with the soft sigh of the wind. “You’ve always kept such tight hold of me.”

“I didn’t want to forget,” he whispers. “I- you, we were friends. I know you didn’t- I know you don’t _owe_ me anything, I just- I’m sorry. I never really let go. I don’t know why.”

She stands above him, the wind picking at her hair and lifting it from her cheek. It’s styled to perfection, fashionable and mature, her makeup accentuating the beauty of her features. She looks good. She looks like someone he doesn’t really know anymore. For the first time he sees her as she is, a person so far removed from the one he once knew that she is more of a stranger than an acquaintance. And for the first time in many years he finds that truthfully, he doesn’t mind. The woman that she is now is not the friend he once had. It’s so simple, and yet it’s taken him so long to see it, to _really_ see it.

“I’m sorry, Leta,” he says again, but this time it’s with a half-smile directed entirely at himself. The wind is dying away, the snow lessening, and all around them there’s an expectant hush. “You know, I think that was easier than I ever thought it could be.”

Leta raises her eyebrow again, and Newt’s smile widens. He shakes his head, hands flat on his knees, fingers curling into the thick caribou pelt of his over-trousers. “I’ve been so wound up with everything that’s been happening recently, with, well.” He looks up at her, squinting against the glare of the light that surrounds them. Far on high there’s a pale, bright disk that must be the sun, burning down through the veil of the mists and making his eyes ache with the brilliance of its diffused light. “Wound up in myself really.”

“Getting stuck?” she asks him, and Newt laughs. Leta had always rolled her eyes over his inability to extract himself from a dilemma brought on by anxiety. One of the things he’d learnt from her actually - stop worrying and _do_ something. He’d forgotten that, forgotten how much he’d admired that trait in her.

“You know what I’m like,” he shrugs, but his smile says it’s a shared joke, and the look in his eyes is more of a challenge than an admission of guilt.

Leta hums a knowing sound, and then stretches out her hand. After a second, Newt reaches up to accept it. As she draws him to her feet he wonders again exactly what she is. The spirit of this place? The magic? A spell or a side-effect of the natural magic of this sacred site manifesting in response to what’s in him? He thinks that last is probably the most likely. The light around them is brightening even further, and Leta’s form is becoming indistinct in the growing illumination.

“You know, you should take more chances, Newt,” he hears her say. “Learn to let go.”

Newt draws in a deep breath, feeling the solidity of her hand in his gloved one. “I will,” he replies firmly.

Leta vanishes, and then there is nothing but the silent, snowy landscape.

  


*

  


Percival is drowning. The water is only up to his knees, but the guilt is in his head, pouring down his throat and choking him up. Some small, distant part of him, the part that has spent its life as a high-ranking auror, a wizard of immense technical skill and ability, that part of him knows that there’s magic afoot here. The rest of him that exists in the here and the now has pushed that tiny voice down, hustling it to the back and far out of the way. Percival can feel only the weight of his failures and hear only the recriminations that live in his head, in his heart, echoing in the one and poisoning the other.

The last fifteen months have been a hellscape of his failures, the accumulated detritus of a life made hollow by one event so monumental it had torn apart the foundations of his entire existence. Percival Graves had thought himself a successful man, a secure man, established in his power and moving into the late prime of his life with an unshakeable grip on his future. One man had taught him the arrogance of his assumptions, and left him sitting amongst the tattered remains of his certainties, like a dreamer come suddenly awake to a cold and harsh reality.

On the surface Grindelwald had failed to destroy Percival’s reputation. There had been queries of course, sidelong looks from some angles and a press that had been outright disdainful, but on the whole the security community had rallied around him. The people that mattered understood the realities of tangling with dark wizards and the ridiculousness of the concept of a flawless record. Mistakes happen. Wizards or not, they’re all just human. Some of them had shown their sympathy as a way of trying their luck; if he couldn’t face working for MACUSA any more there were always options open where they were… And of course Seraphina had backed him, even if doing so had almost certainly ensured she’d be sacrificing her title at the next election. Someone, somewhere, always has to take the blame.

But the surface isn’t what matters, and on the inside Graves has been left with the vicious reality of the aftermath.

_He_ was the one who failed, _he_ was the one that was overpowered, _he_ was the one that should have done better, seen it coming, acted faster. He didn’t, he hadn’t, and at the end of the day he’d done his best and it simply hadn’t been good enough.

He feels it all now, swirling around him like the water around his thighs, the shock of the implications of what had happened. That he wasn’t as good as he’d thought he was, that his friends weren’t as close as he’d believed they were, that he was, at the end of the day, apparently interchangeable with a man in possession of the smallest amount of acting skill. He would be branded forever a liar if he tried to claim that it didn’t hurt him deeply to be shown it so clearly.

The last fifteen months have been a neverending headlong sprint, a flat-out run towards the possibility of redemption. Percival Graves has so much to prove, if not to everyone else - and he would be lying here too if he were to claim it wasn’t so - but to himself. He is self-aware enough to know that most of his self-imposed conditions of redemption hinge on what he must prove to other people, no matter what they might say to his face. In the unlikely event that they are telling him the truth of their compassion then he simply doesn’t damned well deserve their forgiveness. Somewhere back through the years, he has no idea when, he dropped the Quaffle and didn’t even realise he’d done so.

But there is only so much a man can do to salvage his pride and his reputation. He can take responsibility where they allow him to, he can issue grave apologies, he can admit to his mistakes and smile when they tell him that no-one could have done things differently or better. _They_ may not have been able to, he thinks, but _he_ should have.

In the last fifteen months Percival Graves has tightened up his department, doubled down on his efforts to secure his country and gone out of his way to prove to himself that he still can be the man he’d once thought he was. He just needs one thrice-damned thing to go right. He would have liked it to have been Newt, but he’d made an absolute pig’s ear of that whole situation. Just another damned display of arrogance, another set of assumptions that had tripped him up and kicked him in the balls while he was down. Percival is so damned tired of getting it wrong.

Off in the distance he can see Newt. The man is waist-deep in the water, the slow lap of the waves lifting the tails of his blue coat up around him. He’s looking out to sea, and Percival cannot understand how he’s not half-collapsed from the sheer cold of the ocean. He’s too far out for it to be safe, and the wind is still whipping snow in vicious unending gusts across the surface of the water. The blizzard is howling, but the sea is still, and it doesn’t make any kind of sense, but that’s not important to him right now. What’s important is that he’s failed.

“Newt!” His voice is hoarse and tangled up in the wind and the tightness in his throat. If he can get to Newt he can explain himself, he can begin to make amends. If he can just make the man stop for a moment, _listen_ to him. He knows he’s lost his trust and he even knows why, but he’s a fool, and screwing this up has been just another brick in the wall he’s been building, the one that’s been so successfully cutting him off from everyone despite his every attempt to fix matters. A fool that can’t bear to be wrong one more time.

Newt’s not listening. He’s heading out to sea, away from him, and it’s the same as it always has been, he’s always just out of reach and nothing Percival does can ever bridge that gap - between him, between people, between the person he is and the person he wants to be. “Newt! For the love of- Newt, please!”

Percival stumbles on, and the water is so cold it’s making his muscles cramp until he’s shuddering with the breath-stealing chill of it. Somewhere in his head there’s a woman calling his name, and she has the same voice he’s been hearing for weeks, mixed in with the wind and the cracking of the ice against the shore, calling him back even as he tries to follow. She speaks with the voice of loss, of self-recrimination, of guilt and grief, and her sorrow mixes with his until he can’t tell them apart any more.

He calls out for Newt again, desperate now, and hears his name in reply. Someone has hold of his shoulders, and frustrated by the sudden impediment to his movement Percival tries to shrug them off. Amidst the roar of the blizzard he’s losing sight of Newt, the only trace of him the flash of his blue coat through the storm. He calls for him again, fighting off the restraining force on his shoulders, feeling his voice crack with anger at everything - at himself for not being everything he’d thought he was, for being a fool, and at Newt, damn him, for seeing right through him. _“Newt!”_

“Percival! _Percival!_ Stop! _Stop_ it!”

The wind is screaming round him now, snow blinding him as the blizzard throws it into his eyes. The water has started to heave around his thighs, the weight of it almost throwing him from his feet, and someone is yelling in his ear, someone has their arm around his neck, pulling him back even as he struggles to go forward.

_“Percival!_ For the love of-!”

That person is strong, and they have their whole arm wrapped around his neck, he can feel the press of them against his back, but Newt is getting away and if he goes too far he’ll be lost to the storm, he’ll _drown- “Percival!”_

And that- that is, he stops, just for a second, because that had been Newt’s voice harsh in his ear, and in that moment it occurs to Percival to wonder where he is. To feel concern for the sheer desperation he can hear in Newt’s voice. To think _why am I doing this?_ Because the what is obvious, but the why is not, and that is all it takes for the grip the storm has on him to be broken.

Percival stops struggling, but the person behind him doesn’t stop trying to pull him back, and the result is that they both go over backwards. They go down hard and heavy, and although the snow cushions their fall somewhat Percival still lands on his saviour’s chest, knocking the wind out of him.

For a second they both lie there stunned beneath the howling wind, the snow whipping above their bodies, and then Percival rolls to the side, dragging himself up onto his elbows. He reaches a gloved hand up to Newt’s chest, burying his fingers in the front of the other man’s parka, and pulls to get his attention. Newt turns his reddened face towards him and they lock gazes. Beneath the redness the scouring wind has brought to his cheeks Newt looks pale with exhaustion, still drained from the effort of the long-distance apparition that brought them both here. His eyes are bright though as he searches Percival’s own, looking for confirmation that he’s shaken off the vision. There’s no way to be heard over the ruckus of the storm, and instead Percival puts every ounce of his renewed clarity into his expression. He gives the other man a sharp nod and then thumps him on the chest.

Then he climbs to his feet, the storm screaming around him. The shaman had said to go the cairn, she had said to _listen._ So he does, there in the wild heart of the blizzard, far from his home and everything he understands. Except, he doesn’t understand really, does he? The last year has proven that to him. Percival Graves tilts his head back and lets the storm batter him with its fury, tossing his hair in every direction, near pulling him from his feet, and he smiles into it.

He can hear a woman’s voice now, soft like she’s speaking to him across her kitchen table, in the low tones of a friend. Between the gusting flurries of snow he can see a towering edifice of stacked stones, the cairn he has come to find. She sounds, this woman, somehow like his sister, and she says, _let go._

So he does. He lets it all go: the guilt, the remorse, the hell of it all. Like a knot it comes apart, and it’s not easy because he’s been winding it tight for so long now, but at the end of the day Percival Graves, by nature, is a master of transformation. He allows his magic to take him, to bring him back to the point where he feels strongest, changing his form and unweaving him from the grip the storm has on him. He lets himself return to his jaguar form, like diving into a pool of still water, like coming home, the easiest thing in the world, and as he does so the amulet falls to the ground and lands between his paws. He picks it up between his teeth, and then puts his head down and pushes on into the storm.

It takes him hours. Every step is a push back against the monumental weight of the blizzard as it leans its full power into him. The cold is intense, bitter, unbelievably formidable, and the bone of the amulet begins to burn his mouth with the ice that forms across it. But he pushes on, relentless, as that too is his nature. The cairn looms above him, a towering stack of rock slabs that’s far taller than even his human form, and around him he can catch glimpses of other such structures through the driving snow. They stand like silent sentinels and his fur fizzes with the power thrumming off them and between them, resonating to the beat of the storm.

_This is yours,_ he tells the cairn, and the woman to whom it belongs. _I return it to you._

Percival lays the amulet at the foot of the cairn, on the lowest shelf of rock, letting it settle on the untouched stone.

Immediately the storm dies. The wind fades as though the very breath of the storm has suddenly given out, and the furious snow drops off to a flutter of snowflakes and then to nothing at all. Percival looks down at the amulet glinting in the weak light, astounded by the sudden silence all around. His breath is still coming hard, and flooding through his body he can feel renewed warmth, a tingle of power and vitality that signals the return of the full depth of his magic. Flexing his fingers he turns, eyes scanning the horizon.

Newt is lying on his side in the snow, much closer than Percival had expected. The distance is so small, only a handful of paces away, that for a moment he blinks in confusion. It had seemed so far, it had felt like it had taken hours to leave his side and reach the cairn. Newt, still panting from the exertion of their ordeal, but very much alive, looks back at him and raises his eyebrows.

“Is that it?” Percival asks him, hardly daring to hope. “Is that all it takes?”

Newt shakes his head once, tired and apparently wryly amused by the query.  “Just doing the right thing. Remarkably simple sometimes,” he gasps, and then flops over onto his back, spreading out his arms and heaving a huge sigh of exhaustion.

Percival laughs. He leans forward, hands on his thighs and lets the emotion take him. He can feel the wellspring of his magic, pooled in his belly, rushing up through his body and limbs, a welcome return of life and power that makes his skin tingle. There’s a lightness to his body that’s nothing to do with exertion and everything to do with relief. It’s over then, finally - he can feel the certainty of it by the spread of possibilities his returned magic can discern. Finally, he straightens, and then makes his plodding way over to Newt who still lies on his back in the snow, his eyes drifted closed.

Percival goes down on one knee next to him, putting a hand to shoulder and giving him a gentle shake to stir him. “Newt? Still with me?”

Newt’s eyes flutter open and he gives a soft groan. “I think I’m done for,” he moans. “Go on without me.”

Percival laughs, shaking his head. “You’re not dying. Although you’d already be in a graveyard if you were.”

Newt just groans again in reply, and Percival wraps his hand in the thick material at his shoulder and starts to pull him upright, hooking one of Newt’s arms across his shoulders. “On the other hand, we might just be accused of littering. Come on, fella, let’s get you up.”

Newt allows himself to be hauled to his feet, helping as much as he can, then stands leaning heavily against Percival for support. Percival is still smiling slightly, riding the high of his returned magic as he looks around the deserted snow fields. It’s snow and rock in all directions, save for the towering cairns at their back, but with his magical senses restored he can feel the power woven into this place. Atiqtalik had been very much correct - magic layers itself into this area with intricate subtlety, the storm that had risen up a potential reaction not only to the unhappiness of the stolen amulet, but to unfriendly intruders too. This new understanding of the place makes him wonder how exactly Goodfellow had gotten in here in the first place. Some degree of inside help doesn’t seem entirely unlikely, and he files the thought away for future consideration.

“How are you doing?” he murmurs to Newt, and the other man blinks himself out of his haze long enough to offer a truly pallid smile. It’s hardly that encouraging, and Percival gives him a dubious frown in response. “All right then, let’s go home.”

It’s a long way to the apparition point, but Percival can see the lie of the land now, and follow the magic as it channels them out to the borders of this sacred site. Out of respect, he doesn’t try to use magic to hurry them through and the journey back is long and cold and tiring. Eventually though the land slips back into mundanity, the collected magic fading until the snow is just snow again, and the rocks no longer hum with power. Satisfied that they’re clear, he hefts a lagging Newt more securely in his arm and then with one last look around the silent, snowy landscape, apparates them both back to Blacksville.

They disappear with a whip-crack of sound, and after a moment the first few flakes of renewed snowfall begin to spiral down.

  


*

  


Spring brings with it a turn in the weather, and by the time Goodfellow goes to court the last of the snow has cleared from the streets. Newt and Percival have been back in New York for two weeks now, and the speed at which the crook is brought to trial is slowed only by the rate at which the rest of his stolen goods can be identified and processed. Newt continues to stay with the Goldstein sisters, although he spends a great deal of his time down in his case tending to his new arrivals. During this time he barely lays eyes on Percival Graves at all.

Newt’s not entirely sure what to make of what had happened up in the north. By the time he’d returned both Tina and Queenie had been desperate to grill him on any progress he’d made extracting a sense of how much the Director had worked out regarding Jacob. Newt, with an ashamed expression, could do very little except say that he’s almost certain the man remains oblivious. Honestly, in the excitement of everything that had happened he’d entirely forgotten to press the issue. Indeed, so _much_ has happened that Newt can hardly conceive of explaining it all to them. In fact he finds himself outright reluctant to do so, and subsequently locks himself away down in his case, citing care of the creatures as his excuse for his sudden absence. Newt, after all, has a lot to think about.

They’d not met up again with Atiqtalik once they’d reappeared in Blacksville. The shaman had already left town on her way to who knew where, and although Newt had hardly been surprised Percival had seemed rather put out by it. They’d spent the day at the Wanderfalls Guest House, Newt unconscious in one of the armchairs and Percival pushing through his own tiredness to communicate with MACUSA via the little hand mirror Newt had finally remembered. They’d taken the train back towards New York that very evening, and, still utterly exhausted by the immense physical demands of both apparating what they suspect to have been over a thousand miles, and then subsequently being battered relentlessly both physically and emotionally by a magical storm, Newt had simply slept the majority of the journey away.

Upon reaching New York, once Percival had been declared free of any curse-like influence, they’d more or less gone their separate ways. Newt had rather neatly avoided the curious looks of the aurors and Graves himself had caught the elbow of his mischievous second to direct his attention away from the departing magizoologist. Newt had been deeply relieved on that front, for Ibrahim Ismail had worn an expression far too intently interested in him for his liking.

The court date for Frederick Goodfellow comes round on a Thursday afternoon, and Newt attends the trial as a witness. Bringing the case the to trial had been the task of one Siobhan O’Connell, a smartly dressed witch with a cutting smile that Newt would hate to be on the wrong side of. Coupled with how busy the department has been, and the fact that he hadn’t really been supposed to have contact related to the trial with Percival, it had been her that had taken care of briefing him on what to expect. So it was that he gave evidence against Goodfellow, enduring the anxiety of attending an American court for the sake of putting away someone who ought to have known better.

If it hadn’t been for the fact he’d failed to properly secure a number of dangerous magical artefacts, Goodfellow might have gotten off more lightly. As it was, major theft, smuggling of restricted items with intent to sell, unsecured storage of said items and a whole host of other charges in MACUSA legalese had ensured that cooperation or not the man had gone away for a significant amount of time. On the one hand Newt’s well aware of the strict penalties involved in trafficking and smuggling, but on the other MACUSA’s wrath never fails to intimidate him slightly with its depth and potency.

He sees Percival only briefly after the judgement is handed out, a smile thrown across the room and a nod in his direction, and then he’s gone with the rest of the aurors to do whatever it is they do after such a case has been wrapped up. Newt leaves the courthouse with strange warmth in the pit of his belly, and a lot more to think about because of it.

Focusing on his work has always gotten him through emotional turmoil in the past, and although he tries it this time something just doesn’t seem to work. Newt spends more of his days with only a small part of his attention on what he’s doing, the rest restlessly mulling over one Percival Graves. He’d looked good in the courthouse, back to the suave and elegant man Newt had first met well over a year ago. Gone were the lines of stress inflicted by the curse, the paleness of exhaustion replaced by a far more healthy pallor. He’d looked more than good in fact, and Newt is self-aware enough to understand the warmth in his belly for what it is.

“You should take more chances, Newt,” the ghost of Leta had said. Or whatever she’d been. The Leta in his head, or the Leta in the storm, or just Newt half-dead from the cold talking to himself, he’s not sure he’ll ever fully work it out. Whatever she’d been, it’s not bad advice. Just, coupled with what he’s thinking about now, he’s not sure he has the courage. It’s one thing to say you’re going to let go of your fears, quite another to actually do anything about doing so.

That smile Percival had thrown him across the courthouse - the look in his eye as he’d nodded once to him. It had been something more than just triumph at a case won, it had been more intimate than that. It had been a strange look, lingering and intent, and Newt’s not sure he’d read it correctly. But then...there’d been dinner, hadn’t there? Dinner at the Twenty-Twenty-One all those weeks ago, and that night in the hotel where Graves had told him things he didn’t have to. You don’t talk about your most private fears and beliefs if you don’t want _more_ , do you? _Do you?_ Newt doesn’t know. _He_ doesn’t talk about such things to, well, to nearly anyone really. But then Newt’s not normal, he’s well aware of that. What do normal people do?

Newt closes his eyes and the hand that’s holding the trowel he’s using to dig in his seedlings goes still. I’m projecting what I want is what I’m doing, he thinks to himself. There’s taking chances and then there’s cold, hard reality, and the reality is that Percival Graves could have whoever the hell Percival Graves wanted, and the very idea that he might want someone like Newt is a concept born of late-night fantasies that should never be allowed to see the light of day.  

Still though, there _had_ been dinner, hadn’t there? He pushes the thought down in disgust at himself, and goes about his daily tasks with tight lips and a frown.

The Demiguise troupe, despite Newt’s absence, have continued to settle in well. The sisters had more or less left them to their own devices, reluctant to intrude on their sometimes boisterous play. Freedom, even if it is still restricted to the interior of their habitat, is having a very positive effect on the rate of their recovery. All in all Newt is very pleased by how all his most recent rescues are doing.

He hears the little ringing bell some time close to seven o’clock, and a glance at his watch tells him that he’s still early for dinner. The bell is a recent addition to his setup, included at the behest of Tina who prefers to ring for his attention rather than venture down uninvited. As pleased by her consideration as Newt is, he still allows himself some small amount of laziness in the matter, and as such simply gives a quick couple of rings in reply, flicking his wand in the direction of the nearest bell. It’ll travel back up the hidden strings and ring at her end and she’ll know just to come on down.

Newt leans against the upper rail of the unicorns’ forest enclosure, and tries to spot the beasts through the trees. The darkness between the trunks is deep and lit only by hazy moonlight and the slow wandering of fireflies. They’ll be somewhere at the back of the habitat asleep at the moment he suspects, but he doesn’t want to venture in and disturb them. Queenie loves them, though she admits with a sigh that it’s really Tina they prefer, a declaration that makes the witch in question duck her head in pleased embarrassment. Newt’s not entirely surprised by the revelation.

When Dougal comes to tug at his trouser leg, he knows that it’s not one of the sisters approaching. The footsteps give it away too, but rather than turn to watch, Newt lets Dougal sit up on the fence next to him, and folds his arms back across the top rail, looking back out into the false gloaming. Deliberately, he lets out a long, slow breath, and thinks, _well, you did somewhat expect this._

“Newt…?”

“Hello,” Newt replies simply, and after a moment he feels Percival settle next to him at the fence. He’s dressed in his usual office get-up: long coat, elegant suit, neatly coiffed hair. Newt can smell his cologne, and the scent of it makes him clear his throat to escape the reaction it stirs in him. _Idiot_ , he thinks.

“How are they?” Percival asks softly, nodding in towards the forest.

“They’re doing well,” Newt replies. “Everyone’s doing very well actually. Much better than I’d hoped in fact. Despite their unfortunate circumstances they weren’t being mistreated. Inappropriately contained, but not starved. I don’t think they’d been there long enough for lasting damage, which is very lucky for them.”

Percival hums and nods slowly. “Sorry I’ve not been over sooner,” he says. “I wanted to try and see you before the trial, but…”

“It’s fine, I understand,” Newt assures him, shaking his head quickly.

“Even so. I didn’t mean to disappear like that.”

They stand in silence for a minute, listening to the owls hoot in the forest enclosure, the soft singing of a cricket a gentle thrum in the background. The fence creaks slightly as Percival leans on it, and Dougal shifts, shimmering into visibility to pull himself around Newt’s shoulders and find a more stable position on his other side. To his credit, Percival doesn’t jump, but the slight double-take he does tells Newt he’d not been aware of the Demiguise’s presence before then. “He’s not frightened of you,” Newt says with a small smile. “He’d not have shown himself at all if he was.”

“Hm, well, that’s good.” Percival looks sideways at the creature, as though uncertain quite what to make of him.

“He likes you, I think.”

“Does he?”

Newt hums an affirmative and tilts his head to squint into the trees. There’s a glimmer of light and movement between the trunks, like a gathering of moonlight beneath the boughs.  “Oh, look. There! You see them?”

Percival frowns, ducking his head, and Newt says, “Come here, follow where I’m pointing.”

Percival shifts closer, until Newt can feel the press of him against his shoulder. “I see them,” he says.

For a few minutes they watch the unicorns treading carefully between the trees. The beasts stay far back, almost out of sight, and Newt knows they’re probably only showing their faces now because he’s here and his presence more often than not augurs food.

“Will their horns regrow?” Percival asks curiously.

For all that the traffickers had been proficient in their care of the beasts, they had nonetheless been keeping them in order to turn a profit, and ground down unicorn horn is valuable indeed. Newt nods, “Yes, but it takes a year or two to go back to the full length. It’s why they were still keeping them. They would have been lucky though, these girls are all very old, so it would have taken even longer for them to grow them back.”

“Still,” Percival murmurs. “A steady supply of income. I assume it doesn’t hurt them?”

“Well, it’s stressful, and it weakens them in the long run, but no, it’s not painful. The old story about them dying if you cut the horn off is inaccurate.”

For a while they simply stand together and watch the creatures watching them, until the unicorns lose interest and fade away back into the shadows, taking their silvery light with them. Newt is highly aware of Percival’s presence right next to him, of the press of his upper arm against his own, and the scent of his expensive cologne. He doesn’t say anything though, certain that he’d choose something unfortunate. But the unicorns have passed out of sight, and there’s nothing to see anymore but the fireflies floating beneath the branches, pretty but lacking the fantastical nature of the recently departed beasts. Despite that, Percival seems in no hurry to move.

It’s Newt that breaks first. “Is the case completely closed now?” he ventures. As far as Newt is aware it is, but there’s always a chance someone has taken a dislike to his presence again. It’s become less common since his book was published, but Newt’s been doing international field work for long enough now to know not to rest too easy when it comes to Governmental anxiety.

Graves nods, glancing sideways at him. “All done.” He flashes Newt a brief smile. “You’re free to go, Mr Scamander.”

Newt huffs a laugh and dips his chin in amusement, but the look in Percival’s eye makes him pause. There’s something else beneath his words, something not quite so light. “You’re uhm, you’ve not had any more trouble with the curse I take it…?”

“No, no, all good,” Graves assures him. “Not even a sneeze.”

They both laugh, then fall silent, and Newt looks away towards the shed hidden behind one of the other habitats. It’s almost time to feed the Mooncalves, but it’s been so long since he’s seen Percival and despite how awkward he might feel he’s loathe to do anything that might cut the visit short. The Mooncalves can wait a while. It strikes him suddenly that the Director may be here not to update him on anything, but rather to see him off. He’s not sure what he’ll say to that. In truth, he feels rather bad about it in an odd way. Graves is a world away from him in lifestyle and outlook, but Newt has grown- he’s not sure. ‘Fond of’ seems inappropriate. Simplistic. Lacking the nuance to correctly describe the mess of physical attraction, fascination, and irritation with which he views Percival Graves.

“Actually, I came to say thank you for everything,” Percival says. He pushes off the fence, then seems to regret the action, putting his hands into his trouser pockets, his coat pushed back on either side of his thighs. Newt’s never seen him do that before and it makes him look just a little awkward, as though for once in his life the unfailingly self-possessed Percival Graves is wrong-footed. He looks at Newt again, giving him that quick, almost uncertain flash of a smile, that brief narrowing of his eyes that means he’s fishing for a reaction. “And ah, find out what your plans are now?”

Newt blinks. It’s not that he’d been waiting to be allowed to leave, more that the trial had ended only a couple of days ago, and he’s not yet had a reply back from a contact regarding potential re-homing avenues for his latest rescues. “I’m not really decided yet-”

“It’s just that, well,” Graves interrupts him, and Newt stops immediately in surprise. Percival coughs and pulls a brief face to acknowledge the interruption, then says, “I was wondering if you’d thought of exploring other avenues of rehabilitation for the beasts. There are unplottable areas in North America, as you know, and I think it would be a shame to take the beasts out of the country if they were born over here.”

He trails off, and Newt raises a confused eyebrow. Percival knows as well as he does that the beasts will be perfectly fine to travel even great distances while safe down here in his case.

“Newt,” Percival says. “Look, I didn’t come here today to grill you on your plans, I just- we never really worked things out, did we? I mean, curse aside. You were somewhat strong-armed into helping me at the end there, and it took you away from your work, your _life,_ for longer than perhaps was acceptable. And…” Percival holds Newt’s gaze, shaking his head slightly - at his words or at himself Newt’s not sure. “Listen, I’m sorry. I should have tried harder to tell you who I was right from the start. I got it wrong, and I didn’t fix it. I’m a proud man, Newt, and I’ve fallen down several times in the last year or so. My arrogance has gotten the better of me in more ways than one. I need you to understand that, and I wanted to assure you that I acknowledge the awful position I put you in, and your anger about what happened. You’ve ah, you’ve been the better man in all this, Mr Scamander.”

Newt stares at him, feeling the treacherous heat of a blush working its way up from his chest towards his neck. It’ll be mere moments before he’s a flaming-cheeked beacon of embarrassment, and as much as that annoys him the reaction is at war with the surprise he feels. Of everything Graves might have come out with, this raw confession had not featured in Newt’s expectations. An apology. An _actual_ apology. “Really?” he says, and it comes out sounding far more surprised than he’d intended it to.

Graves smiles painfully and nods. “Yes, really. I’d like to offer you a formal apology, if you will, for how I acted. For being a heel. And ah, that’s all I’ll say. I appreciate what you did for me, Newt, and I’m sorry circumstances couldn’t have been different.”

Newt blinks, then huffs uncomfortable laughter. “What brought this on?”

Graves dips his head to the side and briefly raises an eyebrow. “Well,” he murmurs. “A certain near-death experience in the frozen north. Let’s just say I had some time to reflect, both then and since.”

Newt knows exactly what he’s talking about if his own visions out in the blizzard are anything to go by. Briefly he wonders what the other man saw out there, what it is that turns a man like Percival Graves to introspection and moves him to make such outright admissions of culpability as this.

In truth, no matter how much the words are what Newt has wanted to hear, they doesn’t fix everything. They don’t take away the things that Graves knows about him when he shouldn’t, or the time it’s taken him to climb down from on high and accept that other people’s feelings are just as valid and not necessarily in line with his own. A very _Gryffindor_ trait that, Newt thinks. Yes, Percival might make a very typical Gryff. That aside, to be confronted so openly and directly on such sensitive issues leaves Newt frustratingly tongue-tied and mind blank. He stumbles out a, “Well, it’s, that’s...all alright then, isn’t it?” And gives Graves a flustered smile, finding it hard to meet the other man’s very direct look.

“Mm,” is all Graves says in reply, before he looks away, apparently aware for once that he’s managed to intimidate Newt. Newt risks a look at him, feeling somewhat like an idiot who’s letting a potentially good situation slide out of his grasp. It’s not in him to double down on Percival’s apparent guilty complex, but damned if the thought doesn’t occur to him. Still, when he sees the discomfort on the other man’s face he feels a sudden desperation to smooth things over again.

“I had actually,” he says suddenly. “Considered re-homing them here that is. I don’t have room for another herd back home, not right now, and ideally they should live out their lives in the wild. Of course, I could ask Hogwarts to take them, but it’s a little more complex than that. I’ve written to a contact over here, in the hopes they’d take over the reintroduction of the three of them to one of the safe havens, but I’ve not heard back yet.”

There’s a sudden interest sparking in Graves eyes as he looks up at Newt. “Oh really?” he says.

His attention warms Newt, and he feels the situation start to slide back into something resembling more comfortable territory. That unpleasant look of guilt is gone, replaced by the same intensity Newt’s noted and wondered over several times in the last few weeks. “He’s slow to respond sometimes. It might take a week knowing him. Maybe two.”

“That’s ah, well. No-one’s trying to drive you out of the city, or the country, Newt,” Percival says, and Newt thinks he sounds entirely more satisfied about that than he really has any need to. “What will you do in the meantime?”

Newt hesitates, and thinks of the sisters. As much as he enjoys their company he wouldn’t mind a break from them. Percival apparently reads more into his pause than he’d intended. “I’m not trying to pry,” he says with an apologetic smile.

“No! No, not at all. I was just, I mean, I’ve probably spent too long living off Tina and Queenie’s good will. They probably wouldn’t mind if I got out of their hair for a while. I just, well, you know.” Why are people so hard? Newt thinks. Why can’t you just ask him if he’d like to go for a drink, as a friend? You got on fine with him while travelling. “I don’t know New York,” he finishes awkwardly. _Smooth, Scamander._

“You’d be welcome at the club,” Percival says, and there’s an exaggerated tone of caution in his voice that makes Newt laugh inadvertently.

“Well, you know, despite what happened there I did rather like the soup,” he replies.

“We can get you soup,” Percival says. “You can order it tonight if you like.”

Newt looks sideways at him, a little uncertain of what’s being suggested, and Percival immediately backs down. “I didn’t mean to imply, I wasn’t trying to, you know.”

Amused by the suddenly flustered look on the other man’s face, Newt finds himself laughing. It’s not often he gets to embarrass someone else so thoroughly. “Ask for a dinner date?” he teases, for him greatly daring. His every muscle feels tense even as he cracks the joke, that feeling of teetering on a cliff edge where going over is either freedom or disaster. To his relief, and no little surprise, his words come out as lightly as he’d hoped they would.

Percival looks down, his lips twisting into wry acceptance of what could have been a reprimand, no matter how gently it had been delivered. “If you don’t want to go to dinner, I understand. I’m aware that I don’t have a particularly stellar record when it comes to asking you out to dine.” Graves pauses, risks a glance up and Newt can see that same wild mischief in his eyes, that cheeky desire to push for what he wants that both draws Newt in and infuriates him in equal measure. “But, I really would like to get to know you better. Properly. As a person, not-”

“As a jaguar?”

For a second Newt thinks it’s a joke too far, but then Percival recovers himself with a startled laugh. “Yes, yes, not as a jaguar. As...a man.”  There’s a pause, and Newt feels his treacherous tongue go thick and clumsy. “What do you say?”

Percival is looking at him with the same intensity that’s driven Newt to distraction from the moment he first laid eyes on him. Damn, but the man is devastatingly handsome, and, of course, he knows it. He _must_ know it. You don’t repeatedly ask someone to dinner if you don’t think you can charm them somehow. He thinks of Tina’s face when he’d told her about that, how he’d thought at the time maybe he’d been missing something. He thinks to himself, again, _no, surely not. Don’t fool yourself, Scamander._

And somewhere in the back of his mind, Leta’s voice whispers, _you should take more chances, Newt._

“Is- Is this, I mean.” _Get a grip!_ “This isn’t a, ah- a ‘friends’ dinner, is it?” he asks, and almost makes a fool of himself by how breathlessly the words come out, as though his body is trying to make this even harder than it already is by strangling him from the inside. Percival hums, noncommittally, and Newt’s seen that look before - it’s the look of a man waiting to see the lie of the land. He refuses to be drawn, using the adrenaline of his thumping heart to meet and hold the Director’s gaze.

“It doesn’t have to be,” Percival replies softly. “If you wanted it to be something else.”

_Merlin’s balls,_ Newt thinks, _he’s actually serious._ Graves is watching him closely, gauging his reaction with caution, and the silence between them stretches. Apparently he sees something in Newt’s stunned expression that gives him encouragement though, or perhaps he simply wants a straight answer, for he says, “Would you do me the honour of coming to dinner with me, Newt?”  

Newt, looks at him - at this beautiful, eager man, watching him with so much cautious hope - and thinks of all the secrets he knows about Newt, and then all the secrets Newt knows about him in return. Of the sheer arrogance of him, and the thrill. Of the influence he wields, and the raw power of his magic, so much more than Newt could ever summon. Of double life he leads, and the way he makes perfect beast habitats spring from saplings and dust. Of how very, very fine he looks.

_Take more chances, Newt_.  

“Yes,” he says.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I said I'd post both final chapter (this) and the epilogue together, but honestly it's taken me so long I wanted to post what I had so far just as a thank you for waiting. The epilogue isn't going to be 18k, of that I can assure not only you, but also my poor, quaking energy levels. ;] Since it's much shorter and serves to tie up the story it won't take as long to get to you. 
> 
> I know I say this every time, but honestly, when I'm neck-deep in writer's block and apathy, it's the fact that people keep coming back and reading this that kicks me up the arse and keeps me going, so genuinely, honestly _thank you_.


	13. Epilogue - To The Future

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loose ends are tied.

Night brings an elegance all of its own to Central Park. They’ve walked far from the glow of the city blocks, and follow now the paths lit up at intervals by lamplight. Where the lamps fade out, the bright modern lights of the surrounding city illuminate the park well enough for two wandering wizards to easily find their way. Even so, the shadows have their uses.

Dinner had been a splendid affair at one of the seemingly endless list of fine restaurants Percival has knowledge of, and the hour had already turned towards midnight when they had finally decided to head for home. Leaving the chatter and bustle of the eateries behind, they’d made their way deep into the park, following the paths at a distance, keeping out of sight, even though there’s few people around at this hour to notice them.

Newt, to all outward appearances, walks alone. He meanders with his hands in his pockets, looking up at a sky made blank by the glow of the city, the bright electric lights burning more fiercely than any stars. Even now, after nearly two months in New York, he’s still impressed by the grandeur of it all.

There’s a stirring of sound behind him, only noticeable because he’s listening for it, a rush of shadow and air, and then another figure is at his side, dark coat rustling in the gloom. A casual observer may have been moved to take a second look, but upon doing so would have seen nothing but an elegantly dressed man where perhaps their eyes had tricked them into perceiving something far more exotically dangerous.

"Satisfied?" Newt asks.

Percival nods and reaches for his arm. "Quite. Nothing to see here."

Newt's mouth slips into a smile, and he allows Percival to link their arms, restricted from casual observation by the gloom of the trees above them. "Is this a common thing for you?" he asks, and Percival hums a query. "You often patrol your city at night like that?"

Percival's smile is poorly concealed, even in the dim light. "A jaguar sees better in the dark," he replies. "And I'd heard a rumour there'd been gatherings of youths in that area, perhaps doing things that would have given them a regrettable permanent record."

"Mm," Newt says. "I think being personally rumbled by the Director of Magical Security would rather have put a dent in their evenings. I'm glad you didn't find them, I'd have felt like quite a snitch not warning them."

They both laugh and continue on their way through the park, listening to the far-off rumble of traffic and the hullabaloo of late-night New York. Their dinner had been the latest in a string of such meetups, casual affairs where they'd kept the conversation light and the company to just one another. After the drama of the previous weeks neither of them are particularly interested in difficult conversation or soul-searching of any kind. Percival has so far been an eager and attentive dinner companion, and Newt, feeling the freedom of their newly achieved reconciliation, had quickly relaxed back into enjoying something simply for its own sake. Of course, they've both been riding the excitement of future possibility, for although neither of them have mentioned it since, the simple acknowledgement that their dinners are not "friends" dinners has lit a delicious anticipation in each of them.

Still though, Newt’s thinking of the jaguar again, of how Percival hadn’t exactly avoided the question, but certainly hadn’t answered it. Does he patrol the city as a jaguar? Newt thinks that he does, and that perhaps he should not. Someone, somewhere, would think it unseemly. Still musing on this, he lets himself enjoy the presence of the man at his side, the press of his arm against his own, and that faint note of his cologne on the night air. There’s a pleasant buzz in Newt’s limbs, an excitement in his veins that keeps his step light and, without him realising it, the faintest of smiles on his face. To walk arm in arm with a lover is something he’s missed, something he hadn’t realised he’d been yearning for until presented with the reality of it. Not that they’ve made it any further than the first tentative stages of what can only broadly be called a courtship. Five dinners and a lunch one Tuesday - Newt’s not sure what is it they’re waiting on, but the recent past has been so turbulent he’s loathe to do anything that might break the spell.

“I had a letter from Atiqtalik today,” Percival says suddenly. Newt looks sideways at him in surprise, and Percival nods, acknowledging the strangeness of it. “She asked me if I’d worked it all out yet,” he continues with a wry smile. “Or words to that effect.”

Newt lifts his eyebrows in response - the question seems like a very Atiqtalik thing to ask: direct, with just a hint of a challenge. “And have you?” he asks cautiously.

Percival hums thoughtfully, and steers them towards a nearby bench. They take a seat, Newt leaning back as Percival rests his elbows on his knees and looks out towards the bright line of the city block edging the park. Newt lets his eyes linger on the other man’s profile, his face made pale in the gloom. It still makes him wonder what the other man’s doing, walking out with him, but these days that wonder has been pushed aside, in part at least by the thrill of it. And, Newt’s satisfied to acknowledge, the certainty that none of this is, after all, some kind of joke at his expense.

“I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about it, coming back to it all, as I’m sure you have too,” Percival says finally. He threads his fingers together, letting his clasped hands hang down loosely between his knees. “She said I was holding myself back.”

Newt smiles, the movement of his lips small and somehow sad, taken back to the hush in the middle of the storm and the things he’d realised there with the ghost of Leta. Percival glances at him, then pauses expectantly, finding something of interest to him in Newt’s expression. Newt laughs quietly and shakes his head, a little embarrassed to have been caught agreeing. “I experienced something of the same,” he offers at last, reluctant to say exactly what. But Percival doesn’t seem inclined to let him go with so little explanation, and Newt shakes his head again, shrugging. “This, I mean. Getting past the- the _difficulties._ And just...relaxing. Taking a chance. On each other.”

“Romance, you mean?” Percival seems surprised by, but not dismissive of Newt’s words, and Newt realises that for the other man whatever visions he’d experienced, and the conclusions he’d drawn from them, they must be quite different from his own.

“Well,” Newt stalls, unsure.

Percival lifts his clasped hands in a brief bob, a gesture to banish any uncertainty about his reaction Newt may be harbouring. “It wasn’t quite romance for me, but it was…” he pauses, licking his lower lip thoughtfully, and Newt holds his breath. “It was more to do with my own mental state. I’ve been...focusing on holding on to some very old ideas about myself. Things which are possibly no longer a good fit.” He speaks slowly, pausing often as though to gather his thoughts, and Newt listens intently, loathe to interrupt and risk distracting him or putting him off. “I’d become locked into a set of certainties, a...particular perspective, and it was holding me back.”

After a moment’s silence, feeling as though Percival will not continues unless prompted, Newt cautiously asks, “And your jaguar form?”

“Mm,” Percival laughs wryly. “Yes. Well. That I think was partly the curse, but in reality it was more to do with my own pride. Well, no. Let’s be honest now. My own fears.”

“Fear of what?” Newt asks curiously. Three weeks ago he’d never have dared the question, but now there’s an understanding between them, and a familiarity.

Percival breathes out loudly, a long sigh that ends in a breathless laugh. “Fear of change, I believe. Of losing control.” He glances sideways at Newt, something a little shy and somewhat abashed in his expression. “It’s hard to explain.”

Newt takes pity on him, and smiles. “I understand that,” he says. Still, personally he’d thought the whole experience to have been about letting go and moving on. About love and loss and finding your own way back from such things. But visions and magic are strange, and each person reads them differently. He’s not about to tell Percival what to think of his own experiences, besides which Newt’s never been one for the interpretive side of magic.  

“Still though,” Percival says with gentle interest. “Romance?” He lets the word hang in the air, the lift of his eyebrows suggesting that he’ll back down from this topic the moment Newt gives the signal, and pleased by his efforts not to pry too greatly, Newt raises a shoulder and tilts his head in a half-shrug.

“Taking chances,” he says again. “Despite, well. The risks.”

Percival dips his chin in solemn acknowledgement. Magical society may be far more open-minded than the no-maj world, but no-one particularly enjoys the risk of being turned down. “You know,” he says. “That first time I came to see you after we got back to New York, when I came to the apartment. I wanted to ask you out to dinner by way of apology for everything, to make up for the trouble. Yes, I know now I was well shy of the mark, but have mercy on me, Newt. I was trying.” Newt makes a noncommittal sound and they both laugh.

“Anyway,” Percival continues. “It wasn’t just that. I wanted to talk to you. Man to man.” He eyes Newt carefully before continuing, and Newt feels a kick of alarm in his belly. “I wanted to show you my support over, well, your brother’s communication. I thought what he did was in very poor form, he ought to have at least come in person. And I- I suppose I felt much closer to you than perhaps I ought to have done. I know that you spoke honestly, and you wouldn’t have said anything quite so detailed had you known who I really was.”

Percival looks uncomfortable, and winces as he glances sideways and up at Newt. They’ve not spoken of this whole matter, of the idea of his deception, in any depth since that night in the Twenty-Twenty-One, and that now seems an incredibly long time ago. Since then Newt has been almost entirely successful in pushing to the back of his mind the many and varied secrets he’d unwittingly revealed to Percival Graves, living as he was at the time in the form of Nox. The whole meltdown over the wedding invite and subsequent crying into the animagus’ fur has been something he’d really rather like to wipe out of existence entirely. “Hm,” is all he says in reply.

Graves’ lips thin into an unhappy line, and he frowns. “I hope you don’t feel it out of line for me to have said that. I know he’s your brother, and interfering in other people’s family business is...tactless.”

“It’s not that,” Newt says, half laughing, half sighing. “I don’t really understand some of the things you said is all. What you meant by them.” He can feel the words tangling in his mouth, and because of that he wears more of a glare than he’d intended when he turns to meet Percival’s eyes.

“You’ll have to remind me,” Percival says slowly.

Newt’s frown deepens, and he looks away. Beside him on the bench Percival shifts restlessly, sitting up and turning to face Newt. Newt can feel the other man’s discomfort and confusion, and wonders for a second if he’ll try that same mental trick of reading him that he had back in the hotel. Honestly, Newt wouldn’t mind being able to just drop the offending memory into Percival’s head rather than having to rake over it again. But Percival does nothing. He waits instead, and eventually Newt is forced to put his thoughts into words. “After you mentioned dinner, you said that I am ‘amenable to such things’ - what did you mean by that exactly?”

Percival leans back slightly, and the look of confusion on his face is genuine. Newt can see him desperately casting his mind back several weeks, but for once nothing of mercy stirs in him at the other’s plight.

“I had heard that you liked New York?” Percival says slowly. “I- The talk around the office had been of your visits to various tourist hotspots, and I had thought perhaps that you would appreciate being shown the sights by night, ah, particularly the night life. The city is quite famous for it.”

Newt can see from the other man’s expression of confusion and tentative caution that he’s being entirely honest. He feels heat flood his cheeks, and looks away in embarrassment at having been caught out. Percival leans sideways slightly to try and see his face more clearly, but Newt, red-faced and ashamed at his own assumption keeps his face firmly towards the darkness of the trees. “I’m sorry,” he mutters. “I quite misunderstood you. I thought, well.” He does glance at Percival then, and feels even more of a fool when he sees the concern on the man’s features. He looks almost as though he’s ready to bolt himself. “I thought you were mocking my _inclinations_ ,” Newt says uncomfortably.

“Your-?” It takes Percival a moment to work out what Newt is referring to. Realisation crosses his features in a flash, and he is immediately aghast at the thought of it. “No! No, Newt! That was absolutely not my intention. I mean, clearly it wasn’t- or well, obviously not _clearly_ , but. I mean, I just wanted to show you the city, I never intended to imply, Morgana’s tits, Newt! What do you take me for? I’d be a hypocrite if I were to make such jokes at your expense. I mean, well you do realise why we’ve been going out for dinner the last few weeks, don’t you?”

That last is said with such mock affrontment that Newt can’t help but laugh, although he can hear the note of desperation in the other man’s voice, and thinks to himself that he may well have genuinely offended him. “Well, I’d rather gathered you wanted something a little more than to show off your knowledge of the city,” he says. “And your suits,” he adds, lips twitching. After all that’s something else alongside fancy restaurant options which Percival seems to have in ready supply.

Graves sniffs and gives a tiny shrug, recovering his composure quickly. “My suits are certainly very fine, I make sure of it.”

“They are,” Newt agrees gravely, and for a moment there’s an amused silence between them.

“Listen,” Percival says, after a beat. “I really do mean that - I didn’t mean to offend you back then. And anything I heard I can’t unhear, but I can promise you that it won’t colour my judgement of you. I heard nothing to make me think less of you.”

Newt looks at him then; at the sincerity written across his face, at the cautious hope in his eyes, and thinks to himself _I want this, I want him._ He wants the charm and the arrogance, the honesty and the bastard of him; the man that gets things done, through skill or subtlety or power. Percival Graves is _exciting_ , and he’s a handsome devil, and Newt wants him so very much. But still, despite all the things he knows, there’s other things he doesn’t, other secrets. One called Jacob. Newt thinks, for a single, selfish moment, _what if I just don’t tell him?_ And he wonders how that would work, and what would happen in the end were the secret ever to be revealed.  

“There’s...something else,” he says, miserably. “Something I think you don’t know.”

“Newt,” Percival stops him. “You don’t have to tell me everything, you know.”

Newt wets his lips, and frowns. That’s true. He doesn’t. Because of course the secret isn’t necessarily entirely his, and as such it’s certainly not his to tell. As far as he can make out, Percival doesn’t know about Jacob. If Queenie and Jacob are careful, then perhaps he’ll never know. Merlin’s beard, it’s not like he’s swearing an unbreakable vow of honesty to the man! They’re just...enjoying themselves.

“Luckily,” he says, with genuine honesty. “You didn’t get all my secrets.”

He sees Percival’s mouth curve into a sharp grin in the dim light. “Well now, I’m really rather glad of that, Mr Scamander,” he drawls.

Still, Newt hesitates, uncertain, and Percival breathes out long and slow in the darkness. “Everyone has their secrets, Newt. Sometimes, it’s best we keep them.”

For a second Newt’s not sure if he’s been read, and he looks up sharply, but Percival’s face is devoid of accusation, and he relaxes, hushing his nerves. Yes, perhaps he should just leave it at that.

“Besides,” Percival continues. “I have a feeling that _professionally_ I really don’t want to hear about some of your adventures.”

Newt grins, feeling his mood lift. “My adventures?” he exclaims, amused by the look of overblown resignation on Percival’s face. “You’re hardly one to talk! You’re- you’re the auror who runs around as a jaguar fighting crime!”

Percival leans back, slinging his arm along the back of the bench and affecting a weary look. “You too, eh? None of you are going to let that go, are you?”

“Don’t see why we would,” Newt sniffs, playing along. “It’s really quite entertaining.”

“Entertaining,” Percival scoffs. “Well I’m glad you think so. While I’m out here working my fingers to the bone so the rest of my lazy aurors can sleep tight at night-”

“Oh, you don’t!” Newt laughs, shaking his head.

“And no respect from any of you-”

“Is it respect you want from me, Mr Graves?” Newt teases.

“Well, it would nice to have some respect from someone. Do you know, the first time I showed Alvarez my jaguar form, she damned well tried to pet me?”

“Are you sure that’s all she was doing?” Newt asks innocently, and Percival raises both eyebrows at him. “Well, surely you know what the jaguar is symbolic of!”

Percival gives him a wary look, sensing a joke at his expense, and Newt narrows his eyes in amusement. He’d spent six months in the jungles of Peru, apprenticed to one of their wise men, learning the symbology of their beliefs while he tracked down information on Lethifolds for his book. He hesitates for a second, uncertain if Percival will think the information gauche, or rather, the act of him mentioning it to be so. But Percival dips his chin in curiosity, and Newt likes the look in his eyes and the thrill of his attention, so he says, “The jaguar is an important animal to the shamans. He represents strength, and power.”

“You like power?” Percival asks softly, and Newt feels his breath catch slightly at the look in the other man’s eye.

“Some power,” he offers, because although he doesn’t crave it in and of itself, he’d be a liar if he claimed Percival’s innate magic and commanding charisma doesn’t stir him in ways that are not entirely innocent.

“Hm,” Percival replies, and Newt finds it hard to keep his lips from curling into a smile as the other man’s gaze wanders thoughtfully down to his lips. With a slow lean, Percival shifts himself closer, until his arm lies far enough along the back of the bench that should he choose to he could reach in and wrap it around Newt’s side. His knee pushes lightly against the middle of Newt’s thigh and Newt thinks _finally._ Gently, Percival reaches up and cups Newt’s cheek with his hand, and when he leans in to kiss him, Newt presses forwards to meet him.

The kiss is soft and slow, until Newt raises his own hand and slides it along Percival’s shoulder to his neck, drawing him in further. There’s a heat blossoming in Newt’s lower belly, a satisfaction and an excitement that lights up his blood and makes his heart skip erratically. He’s missed this, Merlin, but he’s missed this.

It’s Percival that breaks the kiss first, pulling back, his breath still hot across Newt’s lips. For a second Newt thinks he’s pushed for too much too soon, been too eager, but there’s none of that in Percival’s eyes. “What else?” the other man says.

“What?” Newt asks stupidly, voice embarrassingly rough next to Percival’s composure.

“What else do they symbolise? The jaguar.”

“Oh,” Newt breathes. “Well.” He slides a little closer, and now Percival does reach out with his other arm, letting his hand slip around Newt’s waist to rest on his lower back, thumb rubbing small circles into the fabric of his coat. “They’re called on in many rituals actually. For clarity, and strength. Like I said, they represent power, and fertility. And sex.”

“Is that so?” Percival murmurs.

They kiss, and for long minutes there’s nothing but the sweetness of each other’s mouths and the heat in their blood. Newt keeps a hand cupped around the back of Percival’s neck, the other coming up to rest on his shoulder, and as their kisses deepen he wraps the fingers of this hand in the double lapels of Percival’s dinner jacket, creasing the finely turned out material beneath the tightness of his grip. To his disappointment, Percival doesn’t pull him close, as gentlemanly as he can possibly be while still burning Newt up with his kisses, and all at once Newt realises that they’re still sat out in the open, dark of night or not. He breaks off their kiss, pulling back slightly, and for a second they breathe hot into each other’s space.

“All right?” Percival asks quietly, though the satisfied look in his eye says that he expects the answer to be yes.

Newt nods. “Mhmm, yes. I was, ah. Would you, I mean, we could go back to…?” He trails off, uncertain. He’s never been to Percival’s house, and for a moment he wonders if that was a little too forward. But still, he can’t exactly invite him back to the Goldsteins’, can he? Percival seems a little surprised by the question; not offended at least, but certainly taken aback. He rallies quickly however, then tilts his head in cautious uncertainty.

“If you’re interested in that,” he says slowly, and Newt realises at once that his fiendishly handsome lover is a little on the conservative side. Clearly sex had not been one of the options on the table tonight, no matter what the excited hammering of either of their hearts might say. The thought of it both delights and sobers Newt. “I was hoping this could be more than just, well,” Percival says, seeming a little embarrassed, and Newt realises that he may have misjudged. This then is not to be but a casual fling.

“I was mostly thinking it’s a bit open here,” he says, trying to reassure the other man that he’s not intending too much mischief. “And although I wouldn’t mind continuing this somewhere a tad more private, perhaps not everything, immediately, if you know what I mean. That is to say, I’m certainly _interested_ , but ah, perhaps we might use this as a, ah, a starting point! A basis for further investigation. We have...time?”

Percival is looking at him with open amusement now, and Newt feels his uncertainty start to slip away. Clearly he has not misstepped so greatly as to label himself an unrepentant cad. Although perhaps he did take the other man a little by surprise. “Maybe a drink? If...you want that?” he offers.

“I have wine,” Percival replies, and gently touches the back of his knuckles to Newt’s cheek in a brief caress. “I’m sure we have time for a glass or two.”

“Wonderful,” Newt breathes.

They smile hopelessly at each other for another long minute, and then Percival rises to his feet, pulling Newt up with him. Mental equilibrium restored, he extends his arm for Newt to take, and says, “If you’d do me the honour, Mr Scamander?”

Amused, Newt shakes his head and accepts the gallant offer. If this is to be the way of things, then he’s going to have to be careful to make sure he gives as good as he gets. Finding it hard to control his smile, he takes Percival’s arm and steps in close. With a smile that’s nothing but triumphantly wicked, Percival Graves whisks him away, leaving nothing in their wake but the skitter of stray leaves, and the already fading whisper-snap of disapparition.

  


*

  


Spring has brought with it the fresh vitality of new life, and made of Central Park a place of hopeful regeneration. The day is fine and clear, although still cold enough that a few scarves are in use, tied tightly around their wearer’s necks. Queenie makes her way along the paths, her pale pink coat decorated with a lacy white and silver shawl that had been a present from Jacob. It’s nearly eleven a.m. and she’s due to meet her coffee date shortly. Fiddling nervously with the cuffs of her coat, she takes her courage in hand and makes her way to the little open-air coffee house that’s been set up in celebration of the turning of the seasons.

It doesn’t take her long to spot her date, although he’s less of a date and more of a dreaded appointment. Queenie had received his owl the previous afternoon, and stared long and hard down at the small card, her eyes unseeing, her heart hammering in her chest. Wild ideas had chased themselves through her mind, fears and speculation at war with rationality. There’s no reason for her to be concerned, she has been assuring herself of that ever since. This is nothing but a friendly invitation to coffee extended by a former work colleague to someone he hasn’t seen in a long time. Not once has she managed to quite make herself believe it.

The coffee house is more of a coffee stand, with a cart set up beneath the shade of some trees and a small scattering of delicate iron chairs and tables set closely about. She surveys the taken seats, deaf to the voices but hearing the chatter of their owners’ thoughts nonetheless. When she spots the man she’s come to meet she notices him by his absolute silence long before her eyes manage to pick him out. He, of course, has already spotted her.

Ibrahim Ismail stands to welcome her, a genial smile on his handsome face, a hand extended to invite her into her seat. Queenie sits herself down, a tight grip on her composure as she arranges herself carefully, setting her purse demurely on the table in front of her.

“Miss Goldstein,” Ibrahim says warmly. “A pleasure to see you. You look wonderful today.”

She smiles, and although she knows the expression must be pained, he gives no indication that he has noticed anything amiss at all. As carefully as she concentrates, she can’t feel him reading her, and cannot be certain even that he is doing so. He has a reputation for incredible subtlety in such matters, for one not born a natural legilimens, which of course goes well with his history and position. “Thank you,” she murmurs.

For a short time they make pleasant conversation, talking about the weather, about Newt’s latest book venture, and about the price of fabric these days for he knows of her particular skill with a needle. Drinks are ordered and brought to them, although he takes tea, and, flustered, she stumbles into ordering the same for herself. She doesn’t even like tea.

Gradually, Queenie begins to relax. Ibrahim is easy company, and he fills silences with amusing anecdotes long before there’s any risk of them becoming awkward. He talks about his time off in France where he’d lived with friends for a spell, and his trips home to his family in Britain, and then of his time spent travelling through Syria, of which he speaks with a fondness that makes her wonder. She doesn’t pry though, letting him speak, glad that he doesn’t allow for awkwardness.

Eventually though, Ismail smiles, and turning to her, says, “And what of you, Queenie? How are you and Jacob?”

Her breath catches in her throat, and there’s no chance that he doesn’t read the expression on her face for what it is, for the openness of the question shocks her utterly. “Mr Ismail, Assistant Director, I- I don’t-”

He smiles, even as she stutters, knowing that all is lost. If he knows of ‘her and Jacob’, then it doesn’t matter how much he knows, only that he does. It is a violation of everything their society stands for, an inexcusable disregard of the law that will result in the most serious of consequences. She feels her breath coming short, and knows that there is nothing she can do to escape this. Fleeing is out of the question. He is far more capable than she, and has the law firmly on his side.

“Miss Goldstein,” he says softly. “Please. The question was a genuine one. How are you both?”  
  
She swallows, finding tears in her eyes and not knowing at all what to do. They’d been _so_ careful _._ _She_ had been so careful, because of course Jacob still doesn’t understand what she truly is. “How did you find out?” she asks, surprising herself with how evenly her voice comes out.

He tilts his head to one side and offers her a kind smile. She doesn’t trust it. She knows full well what men like him do in the course of upholding the law, how cold and heartless they can be. They may smile, but they are as unyielding as iron beneath. In the gentle warmth of an early spring morning, Ibrahim Ismail tells her how, when he’d come to collect the jaguar that was Percival from her apartment all those weeks ago, he’d seen the labelled bag from Jacob’s bakery sitting on the kitchen counter. He’d done so much reading of reports while he took charge during the time before Percival was fit enough to return to duty that he couldn’t help but make the connection. “It’s really what they pay me to do, Miss Goldstein,” he tells her gently. “Now please, no need for tears, we should just drink our tea, don’t you think? It really does help.”

And so they do. Ibrahim orders fresh water, and pours for them both, and not once does he make a move towards her, or look at her with anything but the friendliest of eyes. “We’re fine,” she tells him eventually, finally answering his question. “Although it’s quite difficult. He still doesn’t know what I am, or anything about what happened. I’ve been very careful, Mr Ismail.”

“I’m sure you have,” he assures her. “Of course, Miss Goldstein, you are in quite a predicament, and you have come to a point where you must make a decision.”

“I won’t leave him,” she says immediately, defiant even now.

“Quite so,” he replies. “In which case, as your friend, I feel I must lay out your options, to help you make the best decision possible.”

She stares at him, and he returns the look with grave sincerity, and somehow, despite the silence of him, even though his presence is notable entirely for its echoing absence, she finds that she is not afraid. Even knowing his history, having heard every whisper about this quiet, charming man of letters and intricate spellwork, who deals in secrets and misinformation in the way another person might speak of the weather, she thinks that she might be able to trust him.

Over tea and sweet, Parisian-style cookies, Ibrahim lays out her options. She can leave the country, taking Jacob with her, and go to one of the many lands where the rules do not consider the mingling of no-maj and mage to be a sin. Britain, France, Ireland - all places where they could fit in nicely. She could fall pregnant, he tells her bluntly. There would be stigma, but MACUSA is not evil, and exceptions can be made for the sake of a child’s wellbeing. Of course legally she still could not marry him, not in this country. And of course, there is always the possibility that somewhere Jacob may have magical blood in his family tree. No matter how far back the connection, if it’s there and they can prove it? Well.

He lets her consider these options in silence, drinking his tea and watching the people relax in the sun. Tilting his hat back with the press of a fingertip to its brim, he squints up at the clear blue sky and closes his eyes in enjoyment of the warmth.

“Does anyone else know?” she asks him.

“My dear,” is all he will murmur in reply, only the vaguest note of disapproval in his voice. He does not look at her.

“Well then, Mr Ismail,” she says finally. “Thank you for the tea, it’s been very helpful to talk to you. But I think I need to get on now.”

He looks up at her as she stands, squinting a little against the sunlight, and she smiles at him. “I believe I have a trip to plan.”

“Good day, Miss Goldstein,” he says to her. “Take care of yourselves.”

She leaves him to enjoy the sun on his own, his tea still curling steam from its surface long after it should have cooled, and heads out in pursuit of a new life to call her own.

  


*

  


Even with magic a formal tie is a beast of a challenge. And magical assistance or not, after a sleepless, albeit thoroughly enjoyable night, tying an Eldredge knot is starting to feel more like a Herculean task than a good idea for what a man should wear to a wedding. Luckily, it’s not his wedding, or Newt would certainly not have been able to rely on Percival to do it for him.

“Keep still,” Percival says, stepping in close and taking charge. He doesn’t even need magic to complete the intricate knot, and were Newt not so unashamedly distracted by the man’s proximity he might have felt somewhat put out. As it is he smiles across at his partner, the expression becoming deeper as Percival studiously ignores him. “You’re a fiend,” Percival murmurs. Newt doesn’t reply, but his smile stretches into a grin.

Knot complete, Percival pats Newt’s chest with the back of his hand and makes to step back. Newt doesn’t let him. He steps after him, sliding his arms around the other man’s waist, grin wide and a little silly. Percival tries for disapproval, but the glint in his eye rapidly dissolves into a smirk, and then Newt is kissing him so it no longer matters. They break apart after longer than they can really afford, both somewhat breathless, and Percival clears his throat as he regains his composure. Newt reaches up and adjusts his partner’s collar a little, letting his fingers splay against the skin of the other man’s neck.

“You’re going to be late for your own brother’s wedding,” Percival tells him, and Newt shrugs.

“He won’t notice.”

Percival snorts. “I rather think he will.” He reaches up and smoothes a lock of Newt’s carefully subdued hair back into place and shakes his head. “You have told him that we’re coming together, haven’t you?”

Newt hums in agreement, and Percival frowns, squeezing his hips and making Newt wince. “Bit sore still,” Newt laughs, and then laughs harder at the stricken look on Percival’s face. “Don’t worry, love. I’m really fine. I’d have told you in no uncertain terms if I’d not enjoyed anything, believe me.”

“Hm,” Percival replies. “I suppose you would. Still, later…”

“Mm, later,” Newt agrees happily.

“But he does know, doesn’t he? Newt…?”

Newt shrugs. “Well, he knows I’m bringing you, that’s for sure. I put your name on the reply as my plus one.”

Percival narrows his eyes at him. “Newt…” he says again in a warning tone.

“Yes?” Newt replies brightly.

“We are not going to cause a scene at your brother’s wedding!”

Newt manages to hold his innocent expression for all of a second longer, then he laughs brightly, more so when he catches sight of Percival’s face. “Don’t worry! Mother knows. She’ll have told Father and prepped Theseus. We’re not going to make a scene, I’m not out to ruin his wedding with melodrama. Honestly, Percy, what do you take me for?”

“A fiend,” Percival replies immediately.

“You know,” Newt says thoughtfully. “Months ago, when I first found out they were getting hitched, I did consider taking Nox along with me as my plus one. Thought that would cause a stir and make a statement.”

Percival draws in a breath, eyebrows raised. “Yes, I think it would have.”

“A good statement,” Newt assures him.

“Yes,” Percival replies, dropping a small, quick kiss to his partner’s lips. “Well. You have me now.”

“That I do,” Newt replies, with a slow and deeply satisfied smile. “That I do.”

For a moment more they stare into one another’s eyes, and the distance between the people they were six months ago and the pair they are now is both vast and complex. Then Percival breaks the solemnity of the moment with a lazy lift of his eyebrows and a contented squeeze of Newt’s waist. They leave their shared hotel room arm in arm, two fine gentlemen at peace with the world and, finally, with one another.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There we go, only ~100k words over the estimated 20-30k total wordcount. (I've given up, I really have.) Things I have come to understand: No more estimated wordcounts for me!
> 
> I hope you've all enjoyed this - thank you so much for sticking with me throughout, your encouragement has kept this fic being written. Without you all reading, leaving feedback and dropping kudos I absolutely would have given up in despair at myself! So _thank you_.
> 
> If you want to keep up with where I'm going next with fic, you can catch up with me on my tumblr [absolutelynogravitaswhatsoever](http://absolutelynogravitaswhatsoever.tumblr.com), where I take prompts and flail wildly over other people's Gramander art. Or, new as of today you can find me on Pillowfort at [AntiGravitas](https://www.pillowfort.io/antigravitas). 
> 
> Thanks again, everyone. <3


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